Tales of the World New Age Mythology
by MARheaven-ninja
Summary: Kanonno finds a young man unconscious during her work. Living in a oppressive society she smuggles him out of the country. With the clothes on his back, some gald, and a sword, what adventures will be in store for this young man? Steampunkish A.U. (Discontinued)
1. Chapter 1: An Almost Ordinary Day

Chapter 1: An almost ordinary day

It was a typical wintery morning at the beginning of the week in Sakriny as the people of Moslin stood in the lines in front of soldiers handing out the weekly supply of food, clothing, and alcohol. The lines were tediously long as the soldiers asked for a name and searched around for a box try to carefully pry the box from the middle of the pile and handed it to the citizen. The citizen has to take it with no complaints even though the vodka bottle may be smashed due to the box falling to the ground, thus ruining the clothing and some of the perishable foods. A young woman around eighteen with pink hair tied back in a braid, green eyes, wearing a brown long coat and a scarf hiding the bottom half of her face from the windy weather she wore earmuffs over her ears hiding her dangly snowman earrings. Her hands were stuffed in her coat as she trudged to the lines with snow quickly filling her boots. Hovering next to her was a tiny brownish green cat with a white face and brown eyes, wearing a tiny coat and a scarf. The woman stood in the back of the "V" line. She tried to move her toes in her boots in an attempt to keep them warm which was obviously failing. She took her gloveless hands and rubbed them together, and breathed on them.

"Hopefully this week's boots are better than this pair." Complained the girl, taking off her boot to dump the snow out while wobbling on one foot before putting it back on and switching feet to do the same thing with the other boot.

"Now now Kanonno, you know that the chance of receiving boots are slim. You should think of a regular pair of walking shoes." Reminded the cat.

"You're right Laurel the average pair of shoes do better at keeping snow from gathering at your ankles than these old things. Well it should be good enough until we have to send it all back at the end of the week." Laughed Kanonno being half sarcastic.

"Kanonno! Watch your language! You know that you will be in danger if you start badmouthing the government!" Scolded Laurel signaling over to a soldier wearing a brown military uniform wearing a red armband.

"I wasn't badmouthing the government I was just commenting on our generous economic system and how everything gets used." Said Kanonno, while sucking up to the soldier looming near her.

"Wise choice of words young lady." Said the soldier overhearing the two. "Lord Reltih is truly a brilliant man by having a system where everyone has to share with the community and ridding us of the darks, intelligent, and those who proves to be a hindrance to society."

"Yes he was very persuasive in his piece of work "Struggle" it certainly states why our country was in such a depression." Said Kanonno with a fake smile, "It's all darks' fault for getting us into one, we lights are clearly the superior race and know what to do: share everything like a community."

"I couldn't have said it better have a good day miss." Praised the soldier bowing to Kanonno and giving her a wink before leaving.

"That was all a lie wasn't it?" Laurel asked under her breath so no one in the line heard her.

"Yes that's a lie, you've put up with my complaining about the racial laws and how they've nearly murdered Pequist's numbers, and our deadbeat boss wouldn't do anything about it." Said Kanonno just as quietly. "We're now dwindling on five members, including myself, I don't think Pequist will last any longer."

"Lighten up Kanonno, I'm sure things will get better eventually." Cheered Laurel, though her optimism wasn't convincing.

"I know but the question is when?" Sighed Kanonno, it was her turn to receive her wooden crate, she just hoped that the booze didn't spill all over her weekly goods like last week.

"Name." Ordered the soldier, bored.

"Vélvirki." Stated Kanonno, the soldier rushed to the stack of boxes and picked off a box at the top of the pile and handed it to her.

_'At least it doesn't feel like it's leaking.' _Kanonno thought as she jogged back to her place clear across town with crate in hand Laurel flew not to far behind her. She ran into an apartment building and slammed the door behind her then strolled down to a door, put down the crate, dug the key from one of her pockets, she unlocked then opened the door which lead to her living quarters, which was just a small room with a bed, stove, and an even smaller bathroom, there was a small crawl space in the back of the room. She dropped the crate in front of her bed and opened it. She took out a bottle with a clear liquid inside it.

"At least the vodka is safe." She said gleefully.

"Don't even think about it Kanonno." Glared Laurel, "I've hidden all the shot glasses, and besides, you're not allowed to drink until after work!"

"Yeah yeah, I know." sighed Kanonno changing out of what she was wearing into a pair of clamdiggers and a tank top. She dug into the box for her mechanic's suit. She quickly slipped into the baggy jump suit then grabbed her goggles, coat and tool box, and rushed out the door, back into the cold.

Her place of employment was the weapons plant, one section did the research while the other made the weapons, she was a mechanic chosen for the job of fixing the machines that help make the weapons, which doesn't happen very often so she, like few other mechanics who haven't gone home by now drilled tires onto military vehicles for about twelve hours. The mechanics got very bored of using their screw drivers to put on a specific tire on every vehicle they get. Taking a tire, trying to position it correctly, hold it there with one hand, while they would find a screw and a screwdriver with the other and bolt part of the wheel in. Not only did it become boring it also became tedious. Most of the mechanics found it to be a complete waste of their time and skill while the rest, including Kanonno, are just glad that they at least get dinner on the table. If they had gone home the government wouldn't give them any supplies for the following week if they decide to just go home. While Kanonno twisted in a nail she heard a loud thud, she checked her surroundings to see what could have made that sound but it seemed that nothing had fallen, which meant that it came from above.

"Hey, did you hear something fall on the roof?" She asked the person next to her.

"Nope." He said not even paying attention. Kanonno checked to see if there was anyone supervising before putting down her screwdriver and crawling to the stairs. She climbed the stairs on her fours, then got up on her feet when she was sure that no one was watching. At the top of the stair case was a door that lead to the roof, the door was most likely only used for emergency exits so it was hardly ever used. She opened the door and stiffened for it was blowing snow and even though it did get hot in her mechanic's suit it wasn't warm enough. She stepped outside into the snow, fortunately it wasn't snowing hard enough for it to be a blizzard. She spotted a figure not far from her she started walking over to the figure but slipped. The snow that had melted on the roof created a sheet of ice on the flat surface. She cautiously approached the figure, wary of the ice. It was a man around her age with dark chin length brown hair, buck naked and unconscious. He was bleeding from the back of his head.

"Hey … hey!" She called, shaking him a bit, but no response, she pressed her index and middle fingers against his neck, pressing several places near the ear. Until she felt a small beat against her fingers. She sighed, relieved.

_'What the hell is he doing here? Is this a joke? The guy will die from frostbite or blood loss if he's left here.' _She thought, She then got up to get her coat but the exit slammed behind her, she ran towards it slipping and falling a few times, when she tried to reopen the door but it wouldn't open. "Shit … it's locked." She muttered to herself. "What kind of exit just locks up on itself!" She shouted kicking the door. Walking back to the man she unzipped her jump suit and took it off, she shivered as she put her jump suit on the man. She then ripped off the bottom of her tank top to make a make shift bandage for the man which should at least stop the bleeding. She rubbed her hands against her bare arms as she went to the side of the building, the bricks didn't provide an edge to grab onto. She picked the man up onto her back, she had a hard time standing up because he was heavier than he looked and her shoes didn't provide a very good grip. She grimaced over the edge of the building she walked up to it, hesitated, then jumped. She bent her knees to hope that it would soften the impact. The moment she landed she heard a snap, she flinched and shrieked in pain, her left leg was stinging like her arms and her mid drift. She started limping home, moaning from the pain in her leg, she'd figure it may be broken.

"Kanonno!" She heard someone cry, Kanonno looked up to see a young woman slightly older than her with long dirty blonde hair wearing a brown jacket and a scarf run up to her. "Are you crazy? What are you doing dressed like that in the middle of winter!"

"Marianya …" She muttered, "By chance could you heal my leg?"

"Not here, you know that they'd do to those with healing powers?" whispered the young woman. She was silent until she said, "Can you walk to my place?" Kanonno nodded.

Marianya's place was just like Kannono's, it was a small room with a bed, stove, and bathroom. While Marianya used a healing spell on Kannono's leg Kanonno was explaining why she's walking around in a tank top and a pair of pants and the unconscious man.

"I see once I'm done here, you should probably go to the underground." Said Marianya.

"Do you have a crawl space that leads there?" Kanonno asked, "I probably can't go back to my place since there were people that saw me carrying this brown hair kid. Who knows how long it'll be until soldiers start knocking on your door for hiding a dark."

"Yes I do, it's in the bathroom, I'll show you the way to the bunkers." Informed Marianya.

"Thanks I really appreciate it." Thanked Kanonno.

"Well we're members of Pequist, we should look out for each other." Said Marianya, "And I think that'll be good." She stopped the healing spell.

"Thanks … again." Said Kanonno getting up on her feet and hopping on the formerly injured leg to see if there were any lingering pains. The two walked into the bathroom carrying the man, before he was on Kanonno's back again. Marianya tore off some wall paper revealing a sliding door, the passage way could easily fit the three. Once inside, Marianya slid the door shut.

"Follow me." She ordered, walking on ahead. Kanonno nodded and obeyed her order. The door lead to some stairs then a tunnel. It was very straight forward until they hit a fork in the road. Marianya turned left and Kanonno followed, then she turned right, twice until they got into a large concrete room with a few small beds and a stash of weapons in a corner. Kanonno placed the man on the bed then Marianya started healing him with the spell she used earlier. She took off the makeshift bandage Kanonno put on him. While Kanonno pulled out a box from under the bed and took out a button down shirt, coat, and overalls from it and put them on. While she pulled out a vest, a button down shirt, shoes, and pants for the stranger, and some gald.

"What are you gonna do about him? The government may do something horrible to him if he's spotted." Asked Marianya.

"Well we'll just have to ask him about his family tree to see if he has any family members with both the light hair and light skin trait, if not I guess we have to smuggle him into Speg." Shrugged Kanonno.

"Well, if you're gonna smuggle him out of the country you're on your own." Stated Marianya when they heard a moan. The stranger was opening his eyes, he blink a few times, still a bit dazed.

"Where …" he began.

"Oh you're awake." Sighed Kanonno, sitting next to him.

"Where am I?" He asked.

"Don't you remember? You're in Moslin, the capital of Sakriny." Stated Kanonno.

"Sakriny? Moslin? What are those?" He asked, Kanonno gave him a look that clearly said: 'really?'

"Sakriny is a country on the continent Rupuee. Man, for someone who's lived here you sure don't know much about your home town." Assumed Kanonno.

"I lived here?" He asked.

"Ye- you're not from here are you?" Kanonno asked.

"I don't know if have I lived here?" Kanonno quirked an eyebrow, as the man sat up.

"Ah don't sit up, you've lost some blood from your head, please stay down." Recommended Marianya.

"Just who are you anyway?" Kanonno questioned.

"Who am I? … I don't know." The man shrugged.

"Can you at least think of a name we can call you?" She asked. The man shook his head.

"I don't remember anything, not even my own name." Sighed the man.

"Well, you nearly cracked your head open when you fell onto the factory roof, so I guess that could have damaged what ever part of the brain stores memory." Shrugged Kanonno.

"I what?" Shouted the man jumping up.

"Please be quiet! I don't want the government finding us!" Begged Marianya.

"I found you on the roof of the weapons factory naked and bleeding from the back of your head." Explained Kanonno. "Don't worry Marianya fixed you up so you should be fine."

"Mari … anya?" The stranger thought aloud.

"I'm Marianya." She staid, "Kanonno, can you take care of him? I have to make sure that soldiers aren't raiding my house."

"Sure thing, and can you tell Laurel that I won't be home for a while?" Requested Kanonno.

"Alright." Said Marianya leaving the room.

"By the way I'm Kanonno Vélvirki, here, suit up." Introduced Kanonno, shoving the clothes in front of him, he looked at her confused. "You're wearing my mechanic's suit, I'd appreciate it if you'd take it off."

"Oh, sure thing." Replied the man taking off the jump suit and putting on the clothes Kanonno gave him, while Kanonno was looking for canned goods in a different box from under the same bed. "Is this okay?" The man asked.

"It's fine, they're for refugees hiding here anyway, now pick a weapon from a corner and go. … You can walk right?" Said Kanonno not even paying attention to the stranger and stuffing cans and a Swiss army knife in the bag. The man looked over to the corner with guns, some bullets, knives, and swords. Kanonno rushed over and grabbed a rifle and bullets from the corner. The man grabbed a rapier from the pile. "Let's go." Kanonno ordered rushing out of the room.

"Ah yes mam!" Stuttered the man rushing after her.

"If you become dizzy or tired just let me know and we'll stop, understood?" Instructed Kanonno.

"Yes." Answered the man, as the two walked through the tunnels of the Moslin underground.

**Hi ... This is MARheaven-ninja this is my first attempt at a Radiant Mythology or something similar to it fanfiction which I do plan to at least mention every character thus far. If there are any characters that you would like to see in this fic please tell me in the reviews and I'll try to work the character in. Since this is trying to be a Steampunk A.U. almost every character will be in said attire in some way shape or form, except for Innocence characters, it's technically already steampunk.  
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**P.S. I'm sorry if any canon character is out of Character. **

**Also due to some sensitive material the rating may go up later.  
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	2. Chapter 2: Origin of a Dictatorship

Chapter 2 Origin of a dictator ship

The two walked for hours, or it seemed like hours, they couldn't really tell since there was no way to tell time in the tunnels. The man was growing tired, he was panting. Kanonno looked back to him then stopped.

"Why are you stopping?" He asked.

"Because you're tired." Stated Kanonno sitting down and taking out a can and the army knife. "Want some beans?"

"Um … sure …" Said the man sitting down with her as she stabbed the top of the can with the knife. "Kanonno right? Can you tell me what's going on? Why are we running?"

"Hmm … well since your memory's shot, sure." Shrugged Kanonno putting the can down. "This is the country Sakriny, it used to be a kingdom but about 20 years ago it got caught up in a war with Speg, but with dwindling resources the country had to surrender after three years. As time went on the people started getting poorer and hungrier then fifteen years ago the country snapped and was thrown into a civil war.

"The civil war ended when the royal family was murdered and a man named Nicholas Nilen took over the country and started controlling the government. That was short lived since he died from a heart attack and didn't have a successor. The men who helped him take over got into fights, and tried to sabotage and murder each other any way possible. The one who survived was a war veteran named Adolph Reltih.

"He did jump start the economy when he took complete control over it that was the only good thing that came out of it. Everyone had to give up their possessions for 'good of the community' and all that junk, any complaints and you'd get killed. Actually, if you badmouth Reltih he'll take you, your family, your friends, their family, and miscellaneous people that the victim knows, gather them up and shoot them." The man gulped, Kannono continued, "Yes. Our country quickly became poor despite the jump start, everyone having a job, and the rations we are handed weekly. Everyone lived in fear of the government and kept their mouths shut.

"That was when the organization Pequist came about, it was originally a group of writers that feel like they should do something about Reltih's rules and the economy. Then it grew into a guild where they would help people and make sure that no one falls victim to Reltih's purge.

"Things were really starting to look up but about two years ago. Reltih put up some crazy racial laws. Basically it said that anyone with dark skin, hair and or eyes wasn't allowed a job. Shops ran by those people were vandalized then closed down. Then they'd get shipped off to somewhere by train and never come back, with a few exceptions.

"He didn't just target those people he also targeted intellectuals, homosexuals, the disabled, gypsies, people that learned or studied any type of magic, and people who openly worship a different religion, other than 'the religion that revolves around the child of the descender Mary and how he'll save us all and la-di-da' religion. The intellectuals left along with most people who find Nilats to be a nut, while some people hid some of their special traits and pretended that they didn't have them.

"As you can imagine, these laws really damaged Peq's numbers, now it can't really call itself a guild with five members including myself and an incompetent leader." Kanonno finished.

"So what about the people who did come back?" The man asked.

"They seemed broken, and they'd come back with horror stories like the people being sent to labor camps to do nonstop work no breaks to eat or sleep, women and children get burned alive because they were simply too weak, babies being used as target practice, people suffocating to death by gas, people just falling dead next to you and other nightmarish things like that." Explained Kanonno, "The scary thing is, I could see Reltih doing things like that."

"You're getting me out because you don't want me to live those horror stories?" The man asked.

"Yeah, you could be safe if you were put on trial to trace your family four generations back to see if you at least carry the light skin, hair, and or eyes trait. Since you lost your memory I have to smuggle you out, just to be safe." Kanonno explained picking up the can of beans and knife. She ran the blade of the knife against the rim of the can opening it and handing it to the man. "I don't have any silverware so, try not to make a mess, or choke." The man simply nodded and took the can, looked at the contents inside, sloppy mush, he couldn't even tell if it was supposed to be beans. He stuck his fingers into the slimy mush, took out a small blob and stuck it in his mouth.

"Ugh!" he gagged.

"Disgusting isn't it?" Kanonno agreed opening another can of beans, "At least it's not canned spinach." She said using the can top as a plate by dumping the beans on it, though some did fall onto her overalls.

"You sure know a lot about the history of Reltih's rule." Commented the man, trying to get his mind off of how disgusting the mush was.

"That's because I lived through it!" Gloated Kanonno, "If you've lived here since you were born you're bound to know what's happened within the years you were alive."

After the meal they could hardly keep down they went back to having a conversation.

"Kanonno … since I don't have a name as far as I remember could you come up with one?" The man asked.

"Hm? You trust me enough to give you one?" Said Kanonno with a cat smile on her face.

"Well you did get me fixed up when I fell onto the weapons factory, so I think you should come up with one." Explained the man.

"You should come up with that on your own." Said Kanonno, "Stick with something that pops into your mind and that sounds like a name and use that. Besides I'm not good at naming things."

"Something that comes to mind …" The man thought aloud. "I can't really think of anything at the moment."

"Take your time, but at least think of something before we reach a city." Shrugged Kanonno.

"Name name name …" The man murmured to himself, before drifting off to sleep. Kanonno yawned as well, she lied down using the bag as a pillow, it was quite uncomfortable, but it'll do.

When they woke up they continued through the tunnels, took a break when the man was feeling a bit dizzy, then continued down the labyrinth. They couldn't tell how long they've been in the underground, but the man was having his doubts if they'll ever get out. Kanonno's eyes widened when she saw something familiar, then ran forward to a ladder leading up to something resembling a vault, she twisted the handle that latched it closed and shoved it open, and climbed out.

"Come on!" She urged. The man ran after her and climbed the ladder. He flinched once he got to the surface, he blocked his eyes from the sunlight. "You'll get used to it." Sighed Kanonno walking over to a stump, the remains of a large tree; it must've been huge since he could barely see the other end of the stump. Kanonno knelt beside the stump and whispered something.

"What are you doing?" The man asked.

"Praying for a safe journey to Speg." Stated Kanonno.

"What's so special about this tree?"

"Well it's called Yggdrasil, and legend has it that held up the world. Also when it was in danger it would summon someone called a descender to protect it. As you can see it obviously isn't true since the world is still in its place and there wasn't anyone to prevent it from being chopped down." Explained Kanonno, laughing.

"Why was it chopped down?" He asked, with something catching his eye.

"For industrial purposes, my grandmother told me that the people didn't want it chopped down because of a curse or something like that."

"A tree's curse would explain all this bad stuff happening in the country." The man laughed.

"Yes it would, but this tree still a place of worship even though the government tried so hard to keep the people from praying here."

"Maybe this is why the people still pray here." Said the man digging through the snow.

"What?" Kanonno asked walking up to him.

"This." Said the man showing her a sprout peeking through the snow.

"A seedling?" Kanonno gasped.

"Yes, maybe the people found it and used this stump as a place of worship." The man concluded.

"I don't think so, seedlings don't stay seedlings. It looks like it sprouted not too long ago. Besides I heard this tree was chopped down almost a century ago." Stated Kanonno. "I think it's more like the people hope for a descender or something like that."

"If you truly think that you could be right." Said a voice. They looked up to see a small girl with long dark green hair with an outfit to match with one blue eye while her right eye looked like it was burned shut. A chill ran down the man's back, he would say something but he couldn't have a sound escape his mouth.

"Who are you?" Kanonno asked.

"Who am I? Someone who's been watching this seed. It's a bit shy so it hasn't mustered up the courage to sprout until now, or its parent's soul summoned someone to protect it so it probably feels safe." She said without a hint of sarcasm.

"You're kidding right? Are you saying that there's a descender here? That's impossible!" Questioned Kanonno, the girl shook her head.

"With the misfortune man has suffered I should have expected that there will be someone who won't believe." She sighed. "Please answer this, will you say the same things if man has gone through a time of fortune?"

Kanonno remained speechless for a while before answering with "I'm not very religious, so I'm most likely gonna say the say thing."

"Very well, though I don't think you can say that if good things do indeed happen. How about you?" Said the girl turning to the man. "What would you say if man were fortunate?"

The man gave the question some thought before saying: "I don't know. Sorry."

"Nothing to apologize about." Sighed the girl, turning around.

"Wait." Said the man, "What's your name?"

"Name? I lost my name, so … you can call me Siela." Said the girl bowing then walking away.

"That was … strange …" Said Kanonno.

"Yeah…" Agreed the man kneeling down to the seedling brushing the snow away from its roots. "Can I have your scarf?" He asked. Kanonno looked at him awkwardly and handed it to him. He placed it around the seedling making sure he doesn't cover the seedling, killing it. "It might not do much but it'll at least keep it somewhat warm from the snow." The man shrugged.

"I see, we should get going." Said Kanonno walking on ahead.

"You seem to be in a rush." Said the man jogging up to her.

"I just wanted to get to the next town before sundown, which is in at least five hours." Stated Kanonno.

"Sounds like you're paranoid of getting caught by soldiers for being with me." joked the man.

"That and I would probably get killed if they've found out I've been skipping work, if anyone decides to tattle."

"So how long will it take to get to this town?"

"About two hours."

"Will I have to hide my hair."

"That would be a good idea, a very good idea, besides you can get away with having dark eyes easily, the government mostly focuses on hair and skin. I guess you'll have to hide it until we reach Speg."

"Why Speg?"

"It's the closest country with some guilds in it and you can go to Cademeca through Speg since, if you want, I heard that Cademeca has boycotted Sakriny."

"How do you know all of this?" The man asked.

"It's common knowledge, you've just forgotten it all." Smirked Kanonno, the man felt like the words she said shot a bullet through his brain.


	3. Chapter 3: Escape

Chapter 3 Escape

The couple arrived in the city Vylta it wasn't as big as Moslin but it was big enough for Kanonno and the man to not be noticed. Kanonno gave the man a hat to hide his hair. The two headed for the inn just as the sun was going down, the two walked up to the front desk to the innkeeper.

"Is there a vacant room here?" Kanonno asked.

"What do I look like? Your servant? Scram!" Shouted the innkeeper.

"Hey! We're travelers! Is this how you treat a customer?" The man shouted back.

"You know something kid? I hate traveler they always flaunt about they're capitalistic ways thinking they're better!" The innkeeper spat.

"Well …" The man started while thinking of a comeback, "I happen to have close connections to the government …" He lied with a sincere grin on his face "Do you really want them to find out that you were rude to a close friend?"

"What's you're name?" The innkeeper asked frantically.

"It's … Simon." He said spitting out the first name that came to mind.

"Here's your room Mr. Simon, please don't mention this to the government. I've been on edge lately because I hardly have visitor. Please forgive me." Panicked the innkeeper handing the man the key to room 257.

"Thank you very much have a good evening." Said the man bowing his head chuckling a bit.

"I would've threatened him if he was being rude to us, but you've handled it better than I expected … Simon … looks like you've gotten yourself a name." Laughed Kanonno.

"I just hope he doesn't figure out that I'm lying, did anything give it away?"

"No worries, I brought some gald along, we could always bribe him."

"You're quite the villain aren't you?" Said Simon looking over to Kanonno who had a big grin on her face.

"Rebel would be the more correct term." Said Kanonno as she and Simon approached the door.

"So miss rebel what are we gonna do from here?" Asked Simon sarcastically while opening the door.

"Well, we're probably gonna have to sneak onto a train somewhere … but we don't have a passport or visa so we could get caught by soldiers. I think we have to steal some visas or something." She shrugged, flopping onto the bed.

"Why not knock out the soldiers and take their clothes?" asked Simon.

"I don't think they have any female patrolmen and do I have to remind you about your hair?" Argued Kanonno. "Oh what do you know you're the amnesiac."

"Why don't you catch some sleep? We've had a long day we could think about the plan tomorrow." Suggested Simon. Kanonno didn't respond, for she was already asleep by the time.

The next morning, they had some breakfast at the inn and left with a bit of gald on the front desk. The question is how are they going to get across the boarder without getting caught. They were throwing suggestions at each other anything from camping out on top of the trains to hiding in someone's luggage on their way to the train tracks.

"How about we hide under the train?" Suggested Simon, Kanonno gawked at him.

"Do you want to get smeared?" She asked, "How about we beat up a couple of passengers, take their clothes, tickets, and visas and go as them."

"Wouldn't we get caught?" Simon asked, "Why not get on the back of the train and sneak inside when we're getting close to the boarder."

"You know, that might not be such a bad idea." Agreed Kanonno, "We just hop onto the back of a passenger train and then sneak into one of the carts that the patrolmen don't check."

"It's settled then all we need is a train to come by, and us to be at the tracks."

"Relax we're probably almost there."

"How do you know?"

"I got a map of the city while you were eating. The tracks should be within a few feet."

At the tracks they were waiting for a train to come by, as long as it wasn't a cattle train they would be good. The train zoomed by breaking to a stop at the train station. Simon and Kanonno snuck around to the back of the train and went inside the cart, which had accommodations for the crew. Just as the train started to move the two walked to the next cart, Simon let Kanonno jump ahead of him, when she got to the other side she stretched out her hand. Simon grabbed her hand and leapt to the other cart, filled with passengers. This continued until they reached the baggage cart, one cart behind the engine.

They said nothing for a long while until Simon spat out: "And now we just sit here."

"Yeah unless you have some cards." Replied Kanonno.

"Do you think anyone is suspicious of us?"

"Maybe, but more often than not the passengers will ignore us."

"So … can I take off my hat?"

"Go ahead, as long as we don't end up stopping somewhere still in the country we should be fine." Said Kanonno peeking her head out the door to see where they are.

"Hope we only have the boarder patrol and the closest town in Speg."

"I'm not sure about the closest town but I heard that international trains normally head to the capital of a country." Figured Kanonno. "Well except in Sakriny, which stops at a tourist attraction."

"Is it because the government doesn't want to have tourist figuring out what's really going on in the country?"

"Something like that." Shrugged Kanonno. "Anyway if we got onto the right train we should be heading to Saint Gabriel, the capital of Speg. But if we end up at a harbor I guess it won't be that bad."

"That if we end up at one of those labor camps?"

"Then we boarded the wrong train, and well … we'd be dead. Hopefully that doesn't happen if it does we run."

"Understood." Stated Simon, then the two fell back into silence. Kanonno would occasionally look out the cart door to see where they are while Simon just twiddled his thumbs not thinking of anything. Eventually Simon drifted off to sleep.

"Simon … Simon! Wake up!" Whispered Kanonno shaking him. He jolted up as if he had a nightmare, making Kanonno jump.

"Kanonno … Where are we?" He asked.

"We're at a city, now let's get out before we get caught." She whispered, sneaking out through the back of the cart, with Simon following her. The town they arrived in was rainy, foggy, and cold, not as cold as Sakriny. The two ran to the nearest building and slammed the door behind them. The building they ran into was a small church, the people were in the middle of mass when they entered, Simon and Kanonno were greeted with awkward stares from the pews and the altar.

"Um …" Simon began, "Sorry, we were just looking for shelter from the rain."

The priest at the front gestured for the two to sit down. "A guest is more than welcome in the church of the holy tree." The two sat in a pew in the back as the preacher picked up where he left off. "Brothers and sisters we must remember the teachings of the first descender: Martha..."

"What is this place?" Simon whispered to Kannono.

"This is a church that worships a religion that revolves around the world tree, Yggdrasil, they believe that Yggdrasil has holy powers to usher a descender in existence and once the descender has done their duty they disappear or something like that. They also believe in multiple descenders." Kanonno whispered back.

"I see … but why believe in something that's already dead?"

"I don't know. Oh and when the priest calls anyone brother or sister that's just a formality"

" … We should work together for the rebirth of Yggdrasil and the coming of a new age of prosperity." The Priest continued, "Brothers and Sisters remember the message of love that the child of Mary preached to us: Only despair spawns from hate but what sprouts from love is hope. Brothers and Sisters I encourage that we ignore the issues of race and accept each other as who they are."

"I wonder … can we really do that?" Kanonno said to herself leaning back.

"Let us stand." Ordered the priest, everyone, including Simon and Kanonno stood up as the piano in the corner started playing and the worshippers sang a hymn.

After mass, just as everyone was leaving, Simon went up to the priest in the front while Kanonno stayed in the back.

"Excuse me … sir." Began Simon, catching the priest's attention.

"Why what is it brother?" The priest asked.

"My friend and I were wondering where we are…" Said Simon telling the story of his and Kanonno's escape.

"I see, well you are in Madine, Speg, it's not too far from St. Gabriel, trains normally stop here to refuel before heading off to a destination. Though most refugees fleeing Sakriny usually get off here." Explained the priest, tapping his chin. "You know … this town has several guild supporters including myself. Shall I ask the guild to provide you and your friend escorts?"

"It's fine, I was planning to go back after I get him across Sakriny's boarder, I'll be fine if I don't get caught." Said Kanonno overhearing the two.

"Will you be fine without an escort?" The priest asked Simon.

"Um … how dangerous is it between here and St. Gabriel?" Simon asked in response.

"Well, the road does have monsters along it, and there is the chance of getting hit by an automobile, those who know how to defend himself should be able get there without trouble." Explained the priest.

Kanonno face-palmed, _'He's doomed.'_ She thought.

"I need an escort." Stated Simon, Kanonno sighed with relief.

"Very well, I'll contact the guild, please, get some rest at the local inn and come back in the morning." Insisted the priest, Kanonno eyed him suspiciously.

"Thank you." Said Simon bowing down his head.

As he and Kanonno left the church Kanonno whispered to him, "He's a nice man … he's a little too nice."

"Huh?" Simon wondered.

"Oh nothing I just find kindness suspicious. The nice ones are at times the ones to stab you in the back first."

"If that's the case then why don't you find me suspicious?" Said Simon opening the church doors for Kanonno.

"Because you're a random dude with amnesia." Kanonno answered bluntly. "Though how you ended up on the roof of a weapons factory naked and unconscious is odd."

"Yeah … how did I end up there?"

"Hey Simon, wanna make a bet on the priest?" grinned Kanonno, changing the subject.

"Why? You think that he's up to no good? But what are you gonna bet?"

"This bag of gald, if you win you could have it, if I win, I keep it. What do you say?" She offered "Will he bring someone other than a guild member?"

"Sure, but I think that he's not sleazy and will keep his word, what worth will he gain for lying to us? The wrath of some previous descender?" Dealt Simon, jokingly.

"He's a religious leader." Laughed Kanonno, Simon looked at her confused when they checked into the inn.


	4. Chapter 4: To St Gabriel

Chapter 4 To St. Gabriel

Simon and Kanonno didn't speak to each other during the morning when they walked to the church, they were both drowsy because they were at the bar for most of the night. Simon found out that Kanonno should never be allowed in a bar fearing that she'll suck the place dry. They had to stop at a shop to buy hang over medicine before going to the church.

"Good morning you two." Greeted the priest when the two entered, "I thought you were leaving sister."

"I was going to see him off." Kanonno growled, still feeling the hangover headache.

"I contacted the guild, and they're sending someone right now, he should be here soon." Informed the priest when a someone entered the church.

"Excuse me … I'm looking for an Elijah Herman." Said a young man, he was maybe around Simon's age, maybe a little bit younger, with short dirty blond hair, grey eyes, wearing a red headband across his forehead. He had a jacket on and a pair of black pants on he carried a sword on his hip and an umbrella.

"Yes, I am Father Elijah Herman." Spoke the priest, "Are you the escort from Ad Libitum?"

"Yes sir, My name is Cress Albane." The young man introduced, "Who do you need to be escorted to St. Gabriel?"

"Um … me …" Simon peeped, "you see … I'm a refugee fr-" Cress put his hand up, signaling him to stop talking.

"We get a lot of requests regarding refugees." He explained, " Shall we get going?"

"Not yet." Kanonno interrupted, "Simon, can I talk to you?" Simon nodded.

"When you two are done, I'll be waiting just outside the church." Informed Cress.

"You win." She apologized, Simon laughed "Also here." She handed him the bag of gald.

"What's this?" Simon asked

"Isn't it obvious? It's gald."

"I know but why are you giving this to me?"

"Well, you won, and you're gonna need it a lot more that I do." Said Kanonno, "This should be enough to rent a room at the inn for a week or so. Just get a job and don't eat canned crap everyday."

Simon laughed, "I won't I'll probably learn how to cook or something."

"Also, don't come back to Sakriny." Warned Kanonno, "I don't want you to get killed, so … never come back unless you're in a guild, then they can't really do anything about it."

"Alright, I won't come back to Sakriny." Promised Simon.

"Good, well see ya." Said Kanonno, Simon nodded and exited the church.

"Are you ready to go?" Cress asked, Simon nodded.

The trip to St. Gabriel was one miserable trip, Cress handed Simon the umbrella but the blowing wind sprayed rain on him. The umbrella flipped up getting him more soaked.

"I'm sorry about the umbrella." Apologized Simon.

"Well I think that was pretty beat up anyway." Said Cress, then he froze and drew his sword.

"Is something wrong?" Simon asked.

"Monsters." Cress replied, "You have a sword right? Use it if you have to." Simon had forgotten about the rapier he took with him when he and Kanonno got out of Moslin. Some wolf looking monsters ran at them, Cress took a fighting stance then lunged at the monsters, stabbing one in the head then he sliced another one across its abdomen then followed it up with shouting "Demon Fang!" releasing a light from his sword, killing the monster. Then a third monster ran past him and went for Simon. Simon quickly drew his sword and stuck it in front of him, he closed his eyes and turned his head, and fell to the ground and the monster landed on his rapier.

"Are you all right?" Cress shouted.

"I-I'm fine." Replied Simon, shaken.

"Well, that's probably all, for now, but be on your guard." Reminded Cress as Simon pulled his sword out of the monster's gut.

"Yes sir." Responded Simon sheathing his sword. The trip after that went very smoothly except when they almost got hit by a coming automobile. After a few hours later they arrived in St. Gabriel.

The city looked completely different from Moslin, there weren't any soldiers roaming the streets, but they are in front of the palace and the military base. Some civilians roamed the streets looking for jobs, while others are just trying to make ends meet.

"I guess this is where we part, you'll be fine on your own right?" asked Cress.

"Yeah." Simon nodded.

"Okay, well if you need anything, like a job don't hesitate to ask Ad Libitum." Said Cress giving Simon a slip of paper that said _108 Gates Street_. "That is the street address for the guild. See ya." Said Cress.

"Thank you." Said Simon with a bow, then he went to look for the inn when he soon discovered that there's more than one in the city after a conversation with a civilian. "Oh boy…" He muttered to himself. He hustled around the city asking civilians where the nearest inn was, which was the Lylia inn. He asked for directions but some people were rude and refused to give him the directions while others didn't understand them because they spoke a different language. Finally a young man told him to take Ashting street which was a little bit ahead then go right on Wellon road. He followed the directions but he couldn't find the inn until he found out that he actually went left instead of right and turned around. Lylia inn was the building at the end of the street. Though it looked very sketchy.

"Um … hello?" He said peeking his head through the door.

"Yeah?" Said a brunette woman smoking a cigarette, filing her nails.

"I'd like to … get a room …"

"Wait what did you say?" She asked.

"Well, I'd like to get a room and -" He began but she put up her hand silencing him.

"Hold on, you need a room right?" She asked.

"That's what I just sa-"

"u-bu-bu-bu!" She cut off, " Meaning that you're a traveler?"

"Refugee but-" Simon corrected.

"Meaning that you're willing to pay money for an amount of time on a room meaning that we'll finally for the first time since this depression started be able to get … MAINTENANCE FOR THIS DUMP!" She cheered getting up on the desk, screaming, ripping her shirt off, revealing her pink lacy bra, and making some sort battle cry, swinging on one of the hanging planks. The almost cartoonish display left Simon shivering in his boots. He curled his toes in his boots and gripped his fists.

"H …" he began but the racket muted what he would've tried to say, "HOLD ON!" Simon screamed to get the woman's attention, "I just need a room for a week to keep me housed until I get a job."

"Oh …" She said getting off the desk, and putting her shirt back on "I'm sorry you hand to see that, I just get too excited when we get guests. It normally scares them off. Let's see …" She pulled out a price book out from under the desk. "Staying for a week would normally cost for one 700 gald, but since you dealt with my behavior I'll give you 10% off making the total 630 gald."

"Um … should I pay now or pay as I go?" Simon asked, remembering that the inns he and Kanonno stayed in were for a day.

"It's preferable if you pay now." She informed. Simon pulled out the pouch, counted 630 gald and gave it to the woman. She accepted the cash then pulled out a key that read _"206." _"It's on the second floor, and I would keep that rapier with you at all times, we get roaches."

"Thanks …?" Said Simon raising an eyebrow.

"Oh and if you need anything just ask for me, Lediemn Beak or someone else at the front desk." She informed.

"I'll keep that in mind." Simon quickly said as he almost jogged to his room. Once he got to his room he found a cockroach on the crawling floor next to the bed. He drew his sword and snuck up to the roach and skewered it, possibly puncturing a hole in the floor. He looked at it and made a constipated face as he looked for a place to get rid of the cockroach carcass. He looked to the window, then opened it, he scraped the cockroach off the rapier with the window sill, hoping that it didn't drop onto anyone.

It was almost sundown, and he was starting to feel hungry, he went to the lobby, taking the gald with him.

"Excuse me, do you know of any good places to eat?" He asked, Lediemn.

"Well, you could eat here but we don't have a chef anymore since we haven't had any guests. If you want something cheap but good I would suggest Frederic's they don't serve anything that's canned because of rumored diseases. It's on Julianne street." She suggested.

"Thank you." Said Simon. "Where's Julianne Street?"

"Go down Ashting Street then take a left on Resht Street then take a right on Gate's street, Julianne Street is right next to the guild building, 108 gate street. Frederic's is the place that looks like a run down dump. You can meet guild members that go there." She advised.

"Thank you again." Said Simon, leaving the inn. He followed what Lediemn said with the exceptions of confusing left with right. He eventually found his way to Frederic's when he saw Cress walking out with another young man around his age with long periwinkle hair tied back wearing a brown long coat with patches on the sleeves over a pair of slacks, a button up shirt and some belts. He entered the shack.

"Hello, welcome to Frederic's." Greeted a waitress with magenta hair wearing a pair of trousers, apron, and a blouse. "How many are we serving tonight?"

"Just one." Said Simon.

"Alright, right this way." Gestured the waitress leading him to an empty table with two chairs.

"Thank you." Thanked Simon sitting down.

"Good evening, my name is Rutee Katera and I'll be serving you this evening." Welcomed a waitress, with short black hair, violet eyes and wearing the same neutral outfit the waitress up front wore, giving Simon a menu. "Just give a holler if you need anything." She said placing silverware in front of him. Simon looked at the menu, there were five sections labeled 'Appetizers,' 'Main courses,' 'Desert,' 'Alcohol,' and 'Nonalcoholic beverages.' He had seen a menu before but, all that he ever ate the only time when they went to a restaurant in Medine was whatever Kannono ordered just to save some money. He remembered the previous night that she told him what the five categories had, since his memory was shot and he didn't know about some things about the world. As he looked at he menu he heard someone, probably a regular or a guild member, being greeted with enthusiasm then lead to a table.

"Hey kid, may I take your order?" asked Rutee who's right next to him.

"Um … Mabo curry." Said Simon, quickly.

"Sure thing, would you like a drink with that?" She asked writing down the request.

"Um…" He skimmed over the menu, "I'll have … coffee."

"Would you like that with cream?" She asked.

"...Sure…" He replied.

"Okay, one Mabo Curry and a coffee with cream coming up." Said Rutee. He just sat there alone, looking up at the ceiling. He sighed to himself, it would be nice to talk to someone, even if it was just a stranger. He looked over to a girl with pink hair next to him, a young man with auburn hair with a dirty blond man next to the bar, and a group of teenagers clear across the bar. He turned to the girl next to him, she was younger than he was, her dress and headband resembled a flower though she did seem sort of familiar.

"Um … H-hello…" He said to the girl, catching her attention.

"Hello." She responded back, the two were quiet for a while.

"I'm sorry … I'm not particularly social … I hope I'm not creeping you out." He apologized.

"Not at all, it kind of nice to have some company."

"So …" He began, "Yggdrasil …" He said trying to come up with a topic, "do you think it'll grow back?"

"Maybe …" She shrugged, "if this world lasts long enough to regenerate the tree's mana supply."

"Mana supply?"

"Um … forget it …" Shied the girl, "though … did you hear about the story about the tree maiden in … Sakriny?"

"I don't think so … I think that story is banned in Sakriny …" Said Simon remembering the explanation on how Sakriny became a dystopia.

"Really? It's not a story, it's a rumor from travelers who's seen this maiden, is it a government conspiracy?" The girl asked.

"I don't know … who is the tree maiden anyway?" Simon replied.

"The rumor is that she's the spirit a child that might have lost her life when the tree was chopped down." Shrugged the girl. "Though I've heard that she could be a summon spirit because people can touch her."

"What does the child look like?"

"I haven't heard a thing about what she looks like …" Shrugged the girl.

"I see …" Simon muttered to himself when Rutee came back with his order.

"Well … I have to go … it was nice talking to you um …"

"Simon."

"Well it sure was a pleasure to talk to you Simon." She said leaving some money on the table and exiting the restaurant. Simon was alone munching on the Mabo curry and sipping on his coffee, which made him awfully twitchy. The girl he just talked to left him wondering about one thing, the tree maiden.


	5. Chapter 5: Guild Application

Chapter 5 Guild Application

Simon couldn't sleep for most of the night, he was too twitchy for some reason. He got up, paced the room, went back to bed and repeated. He also tried sleeping on different places on the bed and in different positions. He spent most of the night frustrated and trying to lull himself to sleep. Then it finally happened, just as dawn broke he collapsed on the floor, sound asleep.

_He found himself floating in a black space._

_ 'Where am I?' he thought, 'oh right I'm dreaming.' He said slapping himself in the head. He felt a chill run down his spine, he turned, to see that there was nothing behind him._

_ 'You should return.' He heard someone say, he yelped and turned to see Siela standing to the side of him._

_ 'It's you … but what are you doing here?' He asked._

_ 'Return.' She repeated._

_ 'Where?'_

_ 'Sakriny, you must return to Sakriny.' She demanded._

_ Simon hesitated in a response, she was being too vague. 'I'm sorry … I can't return.' He finally responded._

_ 'Why not?' She asked sternly._

_ 'I promised someone …' he began._

_ 'Is it your skeptical friend?' She asked. He didn't respond, she scowled at him._

_ 'Please understand,' he begged, 'she's worried about my well being, since I don't have a memory and have the traits of those who'll get exterminated, so I have to run.'_

_ 'Fool.' She spat, her back turned to him._

_ 'Wait … what are you doing in my dream?' He asked, 'Just who are you anyway?' she turned back to him._

_ 'Let's just say that you and I are one in the same … Simon …' She said, 'What an interesting name choice. Oh, you could always join a guild if you have nothing to do.' She mused to herself before disappearing._

_ 'Siela! Wait!' He shouted, then the black empty space changed to a plain, in the middle of winter, snow fell gently. He looked around wondering what happened. He shivered when a light breeze blew by. He walked forward looking for something. Then he came across a girl in black, a veil covered the back of her head entirely, so he couldn't see her hair color. She knelt in front of what looked like a grave marker, crying. He wanted to reach out to her, but he couldn't move or say a thing._

He snapped awake, he looked out the window, through the rain, he couldn't tell what time of day it was. He walked downstairs to see a man instead of Lediemn in the front desk.

"Excuse me, do know where I can get a job?" He asked the man.

"Not many places have been offering jobs since the depression." Explained the man, "If I were you, I would try to apply for the guild, or if they're not looking for recruits, ask for employment assistance."

"Thank you." Said Simon. He left the inn with a destination in mind, 108 gates street. He followed the same directions he as Frederick's except he doesn't take a turn, he stops at the corner. A concrete building with some windows that loomed three stories high was in front of him. He peeked his head into the building to see a tanned man with silver hair, dressed a bit sloppily, sleeping on the front desk. He entered the building, and walked up to the front desk.

"Um … excuse me …" He said, no response from the man, he noticed a bell right next to where his feet were placed. He tapped the bell, no response. Then he compulsively ringed the bell, making the man jump and fall out of his chair.

"Ow … what the hell was that for? I know it's a slow day but-" The man moaned getting up off the floor, then he spotted Simon. "Oh sorry about that." He excused. "It's Voltday*, business is pretty slow today. Are you here to fill out a request?"

"No … actually … I'm thinking of applying for the guild." Said Simon.

"Been turned down by other companies? Not that I blame you, with this economic depression it's been hard for people to find a job." Sighed the man.

"No … I haven't been turned down by other companies … yet …" Said Simon, the man raised an eyebrow. "I've been told that at least applying here now, as opposed to later is my best bet."

"You have guts kid," muttered the man with a smile, reaching under the desk and pulling out a paper. "Fill this out." He ordered giving him the paper as well as a pen and ink bottle. Simon looked over the paper, he filled out one space where it said "Name," but became confused about the two extra spaces after his first name. He skipped it and filled out "18" where it said age, he skipped the "Date of birth" entry. He wrote down that he was from Moslin, and he was a refugee. He skipped any other questions he didn't know. He tapped the pen to the table. "Is something wrong kid?"

"Um … I don't know what some of these things mean …" He explained, "I've lost my memory recently so I don't know my date of birth, previous employers, special skills, and medical conditions."

"Just fill in "Amnesia" for medical condition, as for the rest, just leave blank for now, and write down your residency." Said the man, looking rather nervous Simon did just that. "We'll get back to you as soon as we can. So in that time, go find another job kid." Simon nodded but he had a feeling that they won't get back to him.

"Um … thank you for your time." Said Simon leaving the building. It started raining again, so Simon ran to the nearest shelter, it had a help wanted poster on the window. He seemed rather interested but was nervous from the reaction he got from the receptionist at Ad Libitum.

"Is something wrong sir?" Asked someone. A blue haired young man, around 16, wearing something similar to Simon's attire except patched up stared at him rather curiously.

"Well … I've been thinking about working here but … I have amnesia and I'm just worried about getting rejected because of it." Explained Simon.

"I don't work yet, but I know that a disability like that will definitely hinder you, unlike Cademeca, Speg doesn't offer assistance to people with amnesia or any other mental disability. So … you're pretty much jobless. You can try to get an education … but these days education is expensive. I had to drop out because it was expensive. "

"I see … its hopeless unless I can remember anything …" sighed Simon.

"Yep, though the guild does take in people like that … Well if they can prove themselves ..." Said the boy. "But if that doesn't work out the factory can always employ a few disposable meat shields." He laughed, making Simon nervous.

"I was just at the guild." Said Simon, changing the subject. "So you're saying that there is hope for me at the guild?"

"Yup, I hear the guild tests you with some jobs then you're in. Though I'm probably romanticizing it, there are probably some jobs where you have to exterminate monsters."

"Then I guess I have to prepare for the worst." Simon laughed. "Thank you very much um …"

"Robin … my name is Robin." The boy introduced.

"Simon." He introduced offering a handshake, Robin took it and then ran off into the rain waving good bye.

*Voltday is the equivalent of Monday in this world.

**I should probably warn you that some of the tales characters may not be very recognizable... I might have to put up references somewhere.**


	6. Chapter 6: 20 Tasks, Introductions

Chapter 6 20 tasks, introductions

_'What am I gonna do about dinner I guess I could try to learn how to cook?'_ Thought Simon looking at the pouch of gald on the way back to the inn, he was worried about spending it all in one go. _'I also need to learn how to fight with that sword if I have any hope to get into the guild.'_ When he got back to the inn Lediemn was filing her nails at the front desk.

"What's up?" She greeted.

"Due to amnesia I'm probably gonna get rejected by every job I try to apply for. Unless you know anyone that will have some use for someone like me." Sighed Simon. "Well, you could always try to work here as a housekeeper." Suggested Lediemn. "Is there anything else?" "Do you know anyone who knows how to cook or sword fight?" He asked. Lediemn raised an eyebrow at him. "Well I don't want to waste all of my money on food before I can get a job, and learning how to use a sword would help me get into the guild, or so I've heard." He explained.

"I know how to cook a little, but I'm only limited to baked goods and rice. As for sword fighting, sorry, I only know a few healing and support spells, I doubt there is anyone in the inn that could teach you." Apologized Lediemn.

"It's all right, um … forgive me for sounding a bit stupid, but how do you make rice?" asked Simon.

"It's simple, you take some rice and dump a cup into a pot then dump in two cups of water and heat it up, but you do have to be careful to not burn the rice." Instructed Lediemn.

"Thank you." Said Simon walking off, "Do you have a kitchen?" "It's down the hall past the stairs to your left." Ordered Lediemn.

In the kitchen Simon looked in the cabinets and drawers to look for the rice, he found a pot and a cup but he was having trouble looking for the rice. He didn't realize that it was in a big brown bag sitting in the corner labeled "Rice," until he turned around. He went over to the bag and scooped out a cup, dumped it in the pot. He went for the faucet, next to one of the cabinets and turned it on, the water was brown and the quality was questionable.

"I would boil that if I were you." Said a male voice, he turned to see the boy he met earlier that day, Robin. "Most of the city has crappy water quality, the only ones who get the good water are the aristocrats and royalty, and filters are expensive. There should be a kettle somewhere around here." He shrugged.

"What are you doing here? I though you went to your home, also I didn't expect to see you again so soon." Wondered Simon aloud.

"Well, while I was trying to apply for a job our land lord kicked out of our home because we weren't able to pay the rent. The shelter was too crowded and my mother felt that it wouldn't be very … "ideal" for my sisters. So the Lylia inn seemed like a cheap place until someone gets a job." He explained. "Sounds tough." Said Simon filling a tea kettle with the brown water. "Yeah, but it could be worse, at least we're still alive." Said Robin, Simon smiled then he looked confused as he tried to figure out how to turn on the stove. It looked like it was fueled by something. He opened a hatch under the stove where he could see the charred remains of logs and figured that that's what he had to put in. He found the logs near the same corner as the rice, he rolled his eyes and grabbed some logs and put them into the stove. He looked for something that could be use to light the wood on fire.

"What are you looking for?" Robin asked leaning over the stove.

"Something to turn on the stove with."

"Move" ordered Robin, searching through the cabinets and pulling out the matchbox. "Since you obviously don't know your way around the kitchen, I'm taking over before you hurt yourself." Simon couldn't come up with a witty comeback because it was true.

Once the stove got going and the water was at a slightly better quality the rice sat on the stove. Robin and Simon were at the other side of the kitchen to keep Simon from opening the pot. Robin flipped through some dusty cook books while Simon constantly glanced over to the rice a bit bored.

"Say Robin …" He began, "you sure do know your way around the kitchen."

"With two, until recently, busy parents, four hyper little sisters, and a dead beat brother, you kinda have to learn how to work around the house. Sure mom does some of the cleaning but she's usually cleaning out other people's houses. Since I'm home most of the time I'm usually taking care of my sisters." He explained, Simon did want to ask about the "until recently" part but he felt it was too personal. "Is there anything else in this kitchen besides possibly stale rice?"

"I don't think so, this inn stopped having a chef when people stopped coming so I don't think they would have anything that would go bad."

"I see, I think your rice is ready." Said Robin, "Don't worry about the stove, I'll take care of it." Simon scooped out some very mushy rice when a hotel employee came in.

"Is one of your names Simon?" He asked. Simon turned, letting some rice burn.

"Yeah …" Said Simon.

"I think this is for you." Said the employee giving Simon an envelope while Robin put out the stove. "And you're Robin I presume?" The employee asked, Robin nodded. "Your parents want to see you." Robin left the kitchen along with the employee. Simon opened the envelope, with some difficulty picking at the wax seal. Inside was a letter, he took it out and read it over.

_To Simon,We are considering to let you into the guild, but this is a time where several are considering to apply and we have few positions available. Even though your application is hardly full you will have to make due with your work effort. You have to go through a test to prove yourself. Come into the guild's headquarters tomorrow for information of the test. Best wishes. Sincerely, Ad Libitum_Simon was surprised, he didn't even completely fill out the resumé due to his amnesia, yet he got a response from the guild. He didn't know whether to feel happy, shocked, or insulted (probably because it was out of pity).

The next morning, Simon went to 108 Gates Street, with sword in hand, a bit tired because through out the night he constantly had nightmares about a tree burning to the ground and him screaming in pain because he could feel the fire torching off his flesh. Also he was constantly awakened by one of Robin's sisters because of cockroaches or something else. Robin left early to look for a job while Simon was sleeping. In there the silver haired man was sitting in his desk up front, he also spotted Robin carrying a staff, along with an older man carrying an axe, and two women, both carrying nothing.

"Finally, it seems like you five are the only ones who want the job. So it doesn't seem like there will be too much competition." Mused the man, "We only have two spots available." Just then a man with messy shoulder length red-brown hair with a very serious look on his face. Like Simon, he wore a long coat over his shirt and vest, but his bottoms of his pants were tucked in, he had googles on his head and he wore some sort of neck tie. Simon got a chill down his spine.

"Claus, are these the new recruits?" The man asked.

"Yes sir, the ones who filled out the application, well except one of them." Said the silver haired man. Simon felt uncomfortable at the remark.

"Very well." Said the red head, clearing his throat. "I am the head of Speg's branch of Ad Libitum, Kratos Aurion, and this is vice president Claus F. Lester." The man introduced. "Allow me to explain the test, you five have to do 20 jobs for the guild."

"You'll have to ask me for a job and you have to go to the location. These jobs will be within St. Gabriel or near the city. These job will range from monster control to community service, to simple errands." Continued Claus. "Your client will be evaluating you based on your stamina, diligence, power, knowledge, and how you act around your client. Keep in mind that these jobs may require more of one field than any other. Any questions?" Simon, slightly embarrassed raised his hand slightly.

"Yes?"

"I'm guessing that you will have to fight, but … what if you don't know how to fight?" Simon asked.

"You're going to have to train on your own time." Answered Kratos, Simon looked over to Robin. "The ability to at least defend yourself will be a necessity in the guild. Any other questions?" No one spoke up. "Very well, meet the rest of the guild, it would be wise to know who may be evaluating you, keep in mind that not everyone's here, you'll be able to meet them as you go along."

"And when you're done, come back for your first job." Ordered Claus The five were free to roam the building.

Simon went into a white room that had a table, with medical utensils hanging next to it, a book shelf for keeping records, and a desk covered in paper work. A blond woman wearing a lab coat over the rest of her clothes which he assumed is just a shirt, vest, and a skirt, was talking to the magenta haired waitress from the cafe, except wearing a dress with a relatively short skirt, a flat cap, and a jacket over the top. Simon knocked on the door to get the girls' attention.

"Am I … interrupting anything?" He asked.

"Not at all, you must be one of the applicants for the job, right?" asked the blond, Simon nodded. "Well then, my name is Mint Adane."

"I'm Cheria Barnes." Introduced the magenta haired girl. "You're in the medical corps of Ad Libitum."

"Medical corps? You help people with their illnesses, right?" asked Simon.

"In a basic sense, yes, but we also heal the injured and we do come on missions, meaning that we have to know how to defend ourselves." Explained Mint.

"That's a pretty useful position." Said Simon.

"It's the least we can do." Said Mint."Hopefully we'll end up working together sometime." Simon nodded.

"It's very nice to meet you." Simon left the room and went to another section of the building where he bumped into a girl or rather, the girl bumped into him. The girl had long blonde hair, wearing a little hat, a jacket buttoned closed, and a layered skirt, she wore a pendant around her neck.

"I'm sorry." They both said at the same time Simon was embarrassed and stopped himself before he could continue.

"You must be one of the new recruits." She observed.

"Yes … Simon." Simon introduced.

"I'm Colette Brunel, nice to meet you." She greeted. "As you can tell I'm kind of clumsy." She laughed.

"Um … what do you do for the guild?" Simon asked.

"I can fight, but I'm usually helping the church with guild related things." Said Colette.

"Thanks, hope to see you sometime." Said Simon, then going to another room, where he met up with Cress and his friend.

"Ah, you're the refugee from Medine, how are you doing in St. Gabriel?" Greeted Cress.

"Well … It's fine … I've only seen the area between the Lylia inn and Frederic's." Said Simon, honestly. "

You're probably gonna see the rest of St. Gabriel sooner or later." Shrugged Cress's friend. "By the way, I'm Chester Burklight." He introduced offering a hand shake.

"Simon." He said taking the offer.

"So what brings you here?" Cress asked.

"Well … I applied for a job and now … I'm being tested." Simon said.

"So Kratos is being hard on the applicants this time around huh?" Chester muttered to Cress. Simon looked at them confused. "Good luck."

"Um … thanks …?" Said Simon, rather nervously.

He explored the building some more, but didn't meet any other guild member, he figured that they're probably out and went back to Claus.

"About time, the others have already gotten their jobs." Sighed Claus.

"I'm sorry …" Apologized Simon.

"Ah whatever, it's not like it's a race, here's your assignment." Claus gave him a slip of paper that said: Cat-sitting, 235 Wydern Street. 50 gald.

**This will not take 20 chapters that would be ridiculous, most of the jobs will be skipped the only ones that will have any depth will be the first and 20th job even though they don't really mean anything. Please review, I could really use the feedback.**


	7. Chapter 7: The First Job

Chapter 7: The first jobs

Simon arrived at the address, he had a tough rime finding because he of the streets with the same name except they would have different ending like "Drive" or "Road." His client inside was an old woman with a house full of cats she referred to as her "children," she was, surprisingly, okay with Simon being late and getting lost.

"It's okay dear, people get lost every once in a while, it's a fact of life." She told him.

"Sorry … um … Why do you need someone to look after your cats?" He asked.

"I'm going to be gone for a few hours, I someone who isn't allergic to cats to look after them while I'm gone." She said. "Here's a list of what the cats need." She said, giving him a few papers. "Will you be able to handle them?"

"I'll be all right mam, thank you." Said Simon. The old woman left Simon alone with at lest 10 cats. Simon looked at the list, it read:

_1. Don't let Margie into the food bag_

_2. Make sure that Lulu stays in her room_

_3. Don't try to get Mittens out of the hole in the ceiling, he'll come to you if you are patient_

_4. Ru can't clean himself so he needs a bath, try not to get scratched_

_5. Give Popsicle lots of attention, he loves it_

_6. Clean up after Teddy after she kills rats._

And so on. Simon couldn't remember all the cats names so he resorted nicknames based off of habits and appearance. For example, he calls Ru Fat cat, Popsicle is Affectionate cat, and Mittens is called Hidden cat. He had trouble keeping up with the cats, once he got one cat away from the stove, another cat was shredding the curtains and at the same time one cat brings a dead rat to him, leaving a bloody mess at his meet. He had a cat scratching at him while he looked for a place to get rid of the rat, he settled on tossing it out the window, like what he does with cockroaches. The cat he didn't have trouble with was Lulu, or Kitty, because she was a small timid kitten, she mewed when she needed something. He wished that all the cats were that tame because he didn't want to get scratched when he separated two cats from wrestling, or something that looked like it. It felt like an eternity of meowing, biting, scratching, feeding, catnip, cleaning and Fat cat making him immobile by simply sitting on him during the hours the owner was gone. During the time his eyes started watering, and he was woman got home in the evening and he looked like a zombie with shredded clothes and blood shot eyes.

"Oh my are you all right dear?" She asked.

"I'm all right mam." He said his voice sounding very guttural.

"We should talk outside dear, I'm terribly sorry dear, I didn't know that you had allergies." She insisted.

"Neither did I." Said Simon, his voice sounding better after they got outside.

"Where my children any trouble?"

"They do love to scratch …" Commented Simon trying not to sound offensive, "I made sure I did everything on the list. They weren't too much trouble."

"That's good, other cat sitters I've had found them to be a pain after one time." Joked the old woman. "I see that all of my cat are taken care of." She said filling out a piece of paper. "You did a nice job, here's your evaluation and your pay." She gave him the slip of paper and the promised 50 gald. When he went back to the guild building, Clause was just about to lock up when he took a look at Simon.

"Damn, what happened to you?" He asked.

"I just got back from a job."

"Oh well, at least it's proof that you were working." He shrugged, "You can't tell if a man has done his work unless he's even a little dirty. That's how it is these days. Now, do you have your evaluation?" Simon gave him the slip of paper. Claus looked over it, "Hm … you're off too a good start." He complimented.

When Simon returned to the inn there was a bit of a commotion going on at the back and no one was at the front desk. The inn's employees were sitting at a small table with Robin's sisters while Robin was cooking in the kitchen.

"What's going on?" Simon asked.

"A celebration, it's the owner's birthday." Said Robin.

"Okay, and they're gonna celebrate here because of money issues I presume?"

"Yeah, since this inn is like a home to them."

"I see … Robin," he began, changing subjects, "You know how to fight right? Well can you help me train?"

"I don't see why not, we can start tomorrow when we finish our jobs."

**Yeah ... Some of these filler chapters will very short, or can be short, I won't be updating for a bit because of school and such.**

**Before I forget, Icey, I would like to thank you for reviewing and for pointing out that my computer does something weird with the spacing, turning it into a big wall of text.  
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	8. Chapter 8: Metting Other Guild Members

Chapter 8: Meeting other guild members

**I might have said this earlier, but, I'm sorry if I end up making the characters out of character and if I butcher the spelling of characters names. The only game I've played are Abyss, Legendia, and Phantasia, (Though I haven't completed the later two) I have not played any of the other games … only watched bits and pieces of walkthroughs, looked on the Tales wiki, and looked through T.V. Tropes, so again, I apologize for making most of the characters out of character. It would help to tell me the personalities of the characters. Also remind me if some of my original characters are becoming Sues.**

* * *

><p>Within 6 days Simon had completed about 10 jobs, they were either errands or community service jobs, the errands were normally shorter than the community service jobs. At the end of the day he and Robin would walk a ways to a clearing outside of St. Gabriel to train. Robin would yell at him to dodge or parry his attack right when he would bruise him with that staff. Simon figured how to defend and attack, though all of his attacks would get blocked, so his attacks were slow and predictable. Robin told him several times that he had to move in combat several times, he promised that the next time they trained he would run around the clearing to motivate Simon to move.<p>

The next day Simon went to the Ad Libitum office his request said that it was an extermination assignment and the client was someone named Lloyd Irving. Claus told him that he was in the lounge room on the second floor. Simon went to the room on the second floor that had couches, two tables, a large one and a small one, a fireplace, and a radio. He looked in to see a young man with brown spiky hair, wearing a shirt and suspenders under a jacket, talking to Colette. He knocked on a wall catching their attention.

"Oh hello Simon," Colette greeted, "do you need something?"

"Um well … I got this job request from a Lloyd Irving …" he began.

"That's me," Said the young man with Colette, "It's nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you too." Replied Simon shaking his hand. "What is this job about?"

"Well, we need to get rid of some wolves in the woods near the road that goes from here to Medine." Explained Lloyd.

"To make travel from here to there safer?" Asked Simon, remembering going down that road with Cress when he first came to St. Gabriel.

"Yep," answered Lloyd, "I still need to get some things, so when you're ready meet me at the eastern exit to the city. "

Okay." Simon nodded remembering that it's the inn closest to Lylia Inn, now if he could just remember the streets. Simon eventually found the eastern exit of St. Gabriel and not too long after Lloyd caught up.

"Are you ready?" Lloyd asked, Simon nodded, "Great! Let's go!" So they headed into the forest next to the road.

It was just as he remembered with Cress, cold and grey, at least it wasn't raining, like it had been for the past few days. Still the cold made his ears feel like they want to pop. The heard a growl and Lloyd drew his sword, signaling Simon to draw his. The wolf monster crawled out of the bushes, sniffed around and stared at them, snarling its teeth. Then a different wolf attacked from behind, signaling the first wolf to attack. Simon dodged the wolf from behind though it didn't stop him from getting his arm bit by the wolf he stabbed the wolf in the eye, forcing it to let go yelping. Then Lloyd shouted something, injuring the wolf then Simon stabbed it, killing it.

"Hey, are you all right?" Lloyd asked.

"I'm fine," Said Simon flinching and rubbing his arm.

"Here," Lloyd offered with an apple gel. Simon looked confused, "It would help with that injury."

"I … didn't know that." Said Simon, "I didn't get any ... Sorry."

"We all make that mistake at least once, we should learn from these things or we'll get scolded for not being prepared." Joked Lloyd, sounding insightful.

"Thank you." Said Simon, taking the gel and swallowing it, the pain from the bite seemed to vanish.

"No problem, let's go, we can probably get Mint or Cheria to look at it after the mission." Said Lloyd, proceeding into the wood, Simon fought at least seven more wolves, each encounter Simon became better at dodging the bites and scratches, and he gradually became better at attacking. Lloyd was the one who dealt the finishing blow on the wolves using some special attack, making Simon wonder how'd Lloyd did that, and if he could perform the attack as well. They killed five more wolves before Lloyd looked at the paper and told Simon that they were done.

While heading back to St. Gabriel Simon asked, "Um … Lloyd? You know those attacks like … Demon Fang or Tiger Blade?"

"What about them?"

"I was just wondering … how do you do them?"

"How do you perform artes?" Lloyd repeated, simplifying the question.

"Yeah."

"Why do you need to know? Do you not know how to use them?"

"I barely know how to fight, I would like to learn of ways to make myself stronger." Said Simon with a shrug, just as they reentered St. Gabriel.

"I'm not quite sure how to explain this … but I know that you definitely need to focus." Stated Lloyd, "You should probably ask someone else about it."

"I will, thanks." "No problem." Said Lloyd, as they got back to the guild's headquarters.

"I assume that you've finished the job?" asked Claus. " Do you have his evaluation sheet Lloyd?"

"Dammit!" Shouted Lloyd digging in his pockets for the piece of paper then frantically grabbing the pen on Claus' desk and scribbling onto the sheet. Around the same time one of the female candidates came in with a young man and girl with him. The man had silver hair and a tattoo on his face. While the girl was an aryan with some of her fringe braided and wore a headband. The young man wore a shirt and jacket like anyone else, except he had wore gloves and had some type of body armor on his knees, while the girl wore a vest over his blouse and a long shirk that would have tripped her if the front wasn't held up by straps.

"How was your job you two?" Claus asked the silver haired young man, handing Lloyd and Simon's pay for the job.

"It worked out for the most part with a few exceptions." Reported the young man handing in the recruit's evaluation.

"I'm very sorry Senel." apologized the girl.

"It wasn't your fault Shirley, we just got caught off guard, it happens sometimes." Said the young man.

"You up for another job kid?" Claus asked, Simon, he nodded. His client was a young woman named Philia at the church. Before he left to do the other job he felt that he should at least know the two guild members that came back.

"Excuse me!" He called for the two guild members, he caught the girl's attention.

"You're one of the recruit candidates right?" The girl asked, Simon nodded. "It's a pleasure to meet you, I'm Shirley Fennes."

"I'm Simon." He introduced.

"I'm her brother, Senel Coolidge." Said the young man cutting in.

"Nice to meet you." He replied, "You two don't look like siblings." He then commented.

"She's my adopted sister." Senel explained.

"I do have a biological sister," Shirley added, "But…"

Simon sensed that he's heading into a taboo topic. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to." He interrupted, "I'm sorry if I brought it up."

"It's fine, we should probably get going." Said Senel, ending the conversation.

"Yeah, I hope we get to work together sometime." Said Simon going to the church.

Once Simon got to the church he was at a lost as to where to go since there was no one up at the altar and there were doors to wither side of him. A young nun with green braids and glasses walked to the pews shaking a blonde young man who was sleeping. He recognized the young woman as the Philia he's supposed to talk to, since he's met her before on community service projects.

"Um …" He cleared his throat.

"Oh, Simon is it? Are you here about the job?" She asked.

"Yes," Said Simon. "Well then … I-" She began just then the young man she was trying to wake.

"Hey Phillia …" He moaned.

"Oh Stahn just in time, I was going to explain the job to Simon."

"Simon? One of the candidates Kratos and Claus are testing?" He asked.

"Yeah … how do you know that?" Said Simon.

"I was recently on a job with … Robin, he did mention you a few times, we were mostly talking about our little sisters, and I'm part of the guild." He explained.

"Oh …" Said Simon feeling a bit stupid for not knowing Stahn was part of the guild. "So … what is this job about?"

"Well, it shouldn't be too difficult, we're just going to be delivering something to Kidneypool." She stated, "I'll be right back." She said going to one of the doors then coming back with a brief case.

"Now in here is something we've been keeping safe for a while and it needs to be kept safe until then."

"All right." Said Stahn, Simon nodded in agreement.

"Good, well then let's go to the train station." Said Philia.

The job was rather uneventful, it was just an hour long train ride to Kidneypool, Stahn fell asleep while he and Philia got into a conversation went from Sakriny, to Health, to Yggdrasil, to memory loss, to his memory loss, to cats. The conversation was cut off when they arrived at Kidneypool. They gave the brief case to a man named Theodore, he gave the guild members their pay while Philia insisted that he shouldn't give her anything and she was doing this for the good will of god. The train ride back to St. Gabriel was a dreadfully quiet one as Stahn slept and Philia filled out Simon's evaluation sheet.

When Simon turned in his sheet it was starting to get late so Claus let him go, he went back to the inn where Robin and Lediemn were taking care of Robin's sisters, it had been a long day for Simon so he told them he'll be taking a nap and to tell him when dinner's ready, and Lediemn reminded him that he'll have to pay the next weeks rent the next day, since he skipped the rent the previous day. He went to his room and fell asleep.

_He wasn't having a lucid dream like he occasionally had, where he's usually talking to Siela about why he should return to Sakriny. She never was clear about her reasoning. This time he was a man that was considered delusional. He warned that the world shouldn't become industrial, he got laughed at and mocked whenever he preached about the dangers of industry and innovation. Then he decided to take matters into his own hands and started burning factories to the ground. The workers and their owners became outraged and thus he was hanged for his crimes._ Simon snapped awake just as Robin was about to wake him up to tell him that dinner's ready.

The next day, Simon was assigned to a job with Robin, Chester, and Cheria to check a cargo train for any opium smuggling, as a secondary check, in Medine, since the authorities might not catch something within the nearby checkpoint city of Medine. Why people are suspecting opium trade on the train, is that the train came from an area that grows the poppies responsible for the drug. So, drug trafficking and inspections have very strict rules. The police forces gave them search warrants to check the load before they went into the train. They checked the carts, starting at the back of the train, they mostly found chopped up lumber, canned foods, and consumer goods. They went through about three train cars and it was staring to get dark, they predicted that it will be an overnight job.

"Did you hear something?" Chester asked, stopping, the other three looked at him. He pointed to a corner, "I thought I heard something over there." Simon closer to the corner Chester pointed to and he was right, he heard some droning coming from the corner. As he got closer to the corner and the sound became clearer, it turned from murmurs to words he can vaguely make out.

"Simon?" Cheria wondered.

"Chester's right, there is something over there." He informed, the other two joined them in, what turned into, their investigation. They searched through the cart, primarily the corner where Chester identified the sound. Then Robin stood at a crate, he crouched down and pressed his ear against it. "

Did you find something Robin?" Simon asked.

"I could've sworn I heard breathing in this crate." He claimed, then a thud came from the crate. Chester walked over to the crate and shoved the lid off, Chester smirked.

"God dammit!" Shouted a voice from the crate, it sounded familiar to Simon.

"I told you that we should be quiet until we get to the docs!" Said another voice that sounded unfamiliar to him.

"Oh put a sock in it Laurel!" Snapped back to first voice. Simon rushed over to see who was in the crate. He found out Kanonno, her friend, tangled on top of each other, and a small green cat with tail wings standing on top of them.

"Ah …" Simon began then he sneezed, catching the girl's attention.

"Bless you." Said Robin.

"Thanks…" Sniffed Simon.

"You!" Started Kanonno sounding shocked.

"Uh … hi …" He said before sneezing again.

"Are you all right Simon?" Cheria asked.

"I'm fine … it's just a cat allergy." He said.

"Oh, I am terribly sorry sir." Apologized the cat flying out of the box, Simon fell back out of shock.

"Ah… no … it's fi-achoo!" He sneezed, followed by coughing and moaning while rubbing his eyes.

"We should go outside." Stated Cheria, helping Kanonno and Marianya out of the crate.

"Anyway, it's good to see you again Kanonno." Smiled Simon getting out of the train car. "How have you been?"

"I'm fine but -" Began Kanonno.

"That reminds me," Interrupted Marianya the cat gave her a disapproving glare, "how's your head, do you feel dizzy or anything like that."

"My head's all right um…" Simon paused for a moment trying to remember her name, "Who are you again?" He asked, Marianya looked offended at the remark while Kanonno snickered.

"I'm Marianya, Marianya Sorge! I'm the woman who healed your head injury!" She hollered.

"Wait a minute!" Cut in Chester. " Simon, you know these women?" he questioned.

"Well, they were the first people I met aster I lost my memory. Though, I don't know the cat." Answered Simon.

"Oh, sorry, I'm Laurel, Kanonno's caretaker." The cat introduced.

"Okay then, how exactly did you two come across him?" Continued Chester, sounding a bit suspicious.

"I found him on the roof of the weapons factory unconscious, naked, and the back of his head bleeding." Explained Kanonno. "I carried him off Marianya's place to fix him up, then I got him to Medine."

"Hold on!" Cheria cut in, "What were you doing on the roof on the weapon's factory, how did he get there?" Kanonno sighed and explained the whole story, from her at work to parting with Simon in Medine.

"All this trouble just for one man?" Chester wondered.

"It's the only logical thing to do, if you knew about the prejudice in Sakriny." Said Marianya.

"Oh, right, Sakriny has laws against those with either dark hair, skin, or eyes." Said Cheria.

"Well, you can get away with dark eyes, and there are exceptions to the law because of their blood lines." Explained Kanonno, "But it's not just that, during the past two years they started taking away people with those traits and sending them away to labor camps to die."

"Why?" Cheria asked.

"I don't know, I think it may have something to do with 'creating a perfect race.'" Quoted Kanonno.

"I'm sure that we all have questions for these ladies, but don't we have a job to do?" Robin suggested pointing to the train car.

"Oh right!"exclaimed Simon, having completely forgotten the job.

"Do you mind if we help?" Marianya asked.

"I don't know …" mumbled Chester, but it was too late Kanonno was in the next car checking the goods.

Several hours later, sooner than they expected, they've finished the job and told the conductor that there was nothing unusual on the train they didn't tell about the two women and the flying cat, for they were hiding. The train conductor paid them equal amounts of gald and went on his merry way. Kanonno, Marianya, and Laurel came out of hiding and joined the four on their way back to St. Gabriel.

"Kanonno what are you going to do about lodgings?" Simon asked.

"Well, we might stay at a shelter until we can find a way to get to Cademeca." Shrugged Kanonno.

"The shelters should still have some room." Stated Chester. "Though if you couldn't get in I think that the guild could provide you with some living assistance."

"Thanks for the offer, but I think someone here may have a little too much pride to ask for assistance." Said Marianya, looking over to Kanonno.

"I'm not that stubborn!" Claimed Kanonno, "I can ask for help when we're desperate!" Simon took out gald, minus that day's pay and gave it to Kanonno. Kanonno seemed quite shocked, while Marianya grinned, and Cheria stifled a giggle.

"What's this?" She asked.

"To help you." He stated.

"But what about the inn's rent?" Robin asked.

"I have enough for a few more days." Said Simon.

"Thanks but I don't need this." Kanonno rejected.

"Consider this as returning the loan you gave me." Said Simon, still holding out the offer. Kanonno stared at him for a while, then gave up and took the gald. Simon smiled at the gesture. Claus had already closed down the guild by the time they got back, since Chester and Cheria live in the guild dorms they told them that they're going to turn in the evaluations in the morning, or at least leave them on the front desk. The women left the two boys to go look for a shelter, while Simon and Robin went back to the inn.


	9. Chapter 9: Spirits and Rejection

Chapter 9: Spirits, and rejection

**Yeah … These chapters will start getting longer because there's a lot of content I need to cover so I don't have to go up to a hundred chapters and you could ask who you want to see in this fic and I'll try to be flexible and write them in. Also this chapter contains something that might be a tad disturbing. Do you remember the jobs being near by thing? Well … I honestly forgot about that so that rule doesn't apply to this chapter. Thank god I have this break to do some writing, happy holidays!**

**XXX**

Days later Simon had done 19 jobs mainly jobs that involve fighting in some way shape or form, in fact, every job since job 13 involved fighting. He slowly improved because he would get some advice from of Ad Libitum's fighters, then Robin would beat him up. On the bright side he became faster at attacking, going from slow arm movements to faster attacks from the wrist. He also figured out how to use strike artes, well he only learned demon fang because he watched Stahn, Cress, and Lloyd. Robin also became much harsher with the training, because he would now throw in strike artes, especially sword rain, which would force Simon to focus more on defense. Kanonno would also give him some tips fighting, through she's no good with a sword, she prefers rifles. He also bet a few guild members, a white haired boy named Genis, his sister Raine, a pink haired girl named Arche, Rutee, and a muscular man with glasses named Will.

He was now on his last job, though a behind the others, they had already completed the twenty jobs, they're waiting for him. Claus gave him the job to investigate the Solar temple, with Claus and Will, which are in the Priam Mountain range miles away, about a five weeks, round trip, walking. Assigned by the vice president of the guild's Speg branch himself. Claus said that they could cut the time to, at minimum, two days by taking the train to the Mountain town, Alp then hiking up the mountain. Though he did warn that it may be dangerous if he isn't prepared, he told them to meet them at the train station in two hours. He wasn't sure about surviving in a mountain range, he thought he might as well ask Kanonno.

"You need equipment to get through the Priam Mountains?" She asked.

"Yeah, do you know what I'll need?"

"Why are you asking me, I've never been higher than 500 feet above sea level." She stated.

"Well, since the mountains will most likely be cold this time of year, and since you live in a cold place maybe you can help me." He explained.

"One, Moslin and other cold places do get warm around the summer, if you remember, two, I don't know anything about mountain climbing, other than you can get altitude sickness because the air is thinner there than it is down here."

"I don't remember Moslin being hot at all, then again …" Just as he was about to trail off, he swerved back to the subject, "I mean … you can get sick just by climbing mountains?"

"Yes, you can (probably) get it through several causes, the only one I know of is dehydration." She said.

"So I need to drink a lot of water before I go?" He asked.

"Not necessarily, though bringing water would be nice, if it wouldn't freeze." She said, "Sorry Simon, I can't really help you here, I guess you're on your own, but I would suggest to bring a coat and some mittens, or something like that."

"So I have to ask someone else?"

"If you have time, just get some things at a shop if you have enough money." She suggested.

"Well with rent, food, buying gels, and giving you that money a few days ago I might have enough for a rope and a cape." He stated.

"The rope may be helpful." She shrugged. "In any case, shouldn't you get going? I mean the train leaves about an hour and a half from now, if I were you I would get prepared."

"I should?" He asked. "Yes." She said bluntly. "Um … okay … See you later … I guess."

"Yep, I'll be slammed at a bar if you need me." She joked. Simon laughed, not getting what "slammed" meant. He walked to a shop some blocks away, closer to the royal palace, which he didn't pay much attention to.

"Huh …" He thought aloud looking at the spired buildings, thinking that it seemed out of place in a rainy area. He then went into the shop, looking for mountain climbing supplies. There were harnesses, hiking boots, walking sticks, ropes of different thicknesses, bullets, anything an outdoorsman would need, all behind the counter. He looked in his wallet then two the prices of the equipment, everything was out of his price range except a pair of hiking boots and cheap rope. He sighed to himself, thinking that he should really cut back on the gels. He came up to the cashier.

"May I help you sir?" He asked.

"Can I get a pair of hiking boots and some rope?" He asked.

"Which one?" The cashier asked, Simon pointed to the cheapest one. "That would be 275 gald." Simon gave him the rest of his money in exchange for the things, he went back to the inn to grab the jacket from Sakriny. He met up with Claus and Will at the train station.

"Are you ready kid?" Claus asked.

"As ready I'll ever be." Said Simon nervously.

"I brought spare equipment, in case any of it breaks." Informed Will, "You can't be too careful on those slippery slopes."

"Thank you Will." Dismissed Claus, as the train came, "Now Simon, do you know what this job is about?"

"You didn't give me too many details." Said Simon as they got on the train. They took a seat in the back of a car.

"This is a research mission Will and I have been meaning to get to for a while." "We're going to the Solar temple to research on one of the spirits of light, Aska. Also to research the Apocalypse Period." Explained Will.

"I'm sorry, but what are the spirits and the Apocalypse Period?" Simon asked.

"I should have known." Sighed Claus.

"Well, things we research isn't exactly common knowledge." Shrugged Will before clearing his throat. "Well, there's a legend from the Goddess cult: 'The goddesses were born into an empty space they wandered through it until they found a seed. They planted the seed and gave it nourishment until a tree sprouted from it. When the tree grew it gathered dust from its surroundings this creating the world. The goddesses noticed that the world was barren, so they decided to … fill it up with many wonders. One goddess created the sun, the moon, and the seas, as well as the stars and clouds. The Second goddess created the landforms we see and weather patterns. While the third goddess created life and the spirits that watched over life.'

"As ridiculous as it sounds the legend does hold some ground. People have discovered 'tombs' that belong to the spirits and the people can actually form a 'contract' with them and summon them when needed."

"So people have actually seen these spirits?" Simon asked.

"Yes, reports on spirits roaming around or being summoned to battle have been reported throughout history but people say they usually see the spirits within their tombs." Will explained.

"How many spirits are there?"

"As far as we know … sixteen." Said Claus, "Twelve known ones and four only mentioned in legend, never really seen."

"What are their names? I might have heard of a few." Lied Simon.

"The ones I can remember are: Undine, The water spirit, Efreet, the fire spirit, Sylph, the wind spirit, Gnome, the earth spirit, Maxwell, the lord of the spirits, Celsius, the ice spirit, Luna, the spirit of moon light, Aska, the spirit of sun light, Shadow, the spirit of Darkness, Muse, the guardian spirit, and Lorelei, the healing spirit. Only Maxwell, Muse, and Lorelei are a few of the theoretical ones." Listed Claus.

"Okay, I think I get the spirits … but what about this Apocalypse period and what does this have to do with the spirits?"

"Well, it happened at least five thousand years ago." Will began, "This world had advanced civilizations, in fact, some of our inventions are just reinvented versions of the technologies that were around the time."Anyway, despite the advancements of their civilization, the people were at war with each other. They used devastating weapons on their enemies as well as the spirits' powers. The period wars destroyed civilizations and almost whipped out the entire human race, and the wars almost killed Yggdrasil."

"I'm sorry … but how long has Yggdrasil been around before it was chopped down?" Simon asked again.

"Roughly ten thousand years." Said Will then going back to his story, "After the wars the spirits were sealed away except for of course the theoretical spirits who supposedly disappeared before the period. Life was restored to the dying planet over time and the humans had to start over from being hunters and gatherers."

"Our objective is well for me is to form a contract with a spirit, before someone gets to it and abuses its powers." Said Claus. "Also to research the anything found within the Solar temple."

"So I'm assisting you in your research." Concluded Simon.

"Smart boy." Smirked Claus just as they arrived at the mountain town, Alp.

Simon rubbed his hands trying to keep them warm, wishing that he had brought gloves Will nudged him and gave him the spare gloves. Simon nodded and put them on as they went into a cabin, an information center. Claus looked at a map posted on the wall while Simon looked outside at the snow blowing on the log cabins and the cables looming over head not too far away. He wondered what would happen if the cables snapped from the snow and wind, he shuddered.

"Excuse me," he heard Claus say to the attendant, Simon turned to see what's going on, "can we take cable cars to the Solar temple?"

"I'm sorry sir, those are for tours and going to the higher places in town the highest they can take you is to the mayor's residence." The attendant said. "We can't even use the cable cars now because of this storm. We're not allowing any hiking until we take care of the possible avalanche areas."

"How long will that take?" Claus asked. "At minimum … two days longer depending on how long this snow lasts."

"I see …" Claus walked up to Will who was examining the map.

"Are we going back?" Will asked. Claus looked over to Simon, who resumed to space out.

"No, we're going to wait out the storm, besides I can't do an evaluation on the kid if we turn back."

"Are you crazy? The boy might get killed out here!" Will exclaimed, which caught Simon's attention.

"True, he might die since he's not too well prepared, but I think it might do him some good." Said Claus, "It will definitely teach him that he needs to be prepared no matter what the situation." As much as it hurt, it was true, he was the least prepared of the three of them. If anything, it taught him to spend his money more wisely so he can get the equipment he needed.

_'I'm screwed, at least I never leave without my sword.' _Thought Simon looking for consolation, trying to think of mountain climbing uses for a sword. He couldn't think of any.

"We should at least get to an inn." Said Claus, then calling to Simon.

The three left the information center to the inn down town. Claus checked in a room at the inn.

"As you probably know, we're going to be stuck here until the snow passes." Began Claus. "We won't be able to go to the solar temple." Simon mentally sighed with relief, because it meant that he wouldn't have to hike and die. "However, I do not intend to go home empty handed which is why I decided to try to make it stop snowing."

"How will you do that?" Simon asked, while Will darted a glare at Claus, Claus smirked back pulling out a book.

"Well kid, let's just say you're about to learn a few more things about spirits." He said taking out a ring then flipping to a page. "Come forth maiden of ice! Celsius!" A magic circle appeared on the floor on the room a woman with blue hair and skin clad in blues and whites rose from the floor. Simon fell over out of amazement and shock.

"What have you summoned me for master?" She asked, bowing down to Claus.

"Celsius, are you able to control snowfall?" Claus asked.

"I can master."

"It's snowing outside, will you be able to stop it?"

"Very well." Said Celsius raising her hand. A light came from her hand then faded away. "It should be able to make your travels easier. I should warn you, because of the snow, you might run into an avalanche, if you're in the mountains." She warned. Simon watched the spirit in awe while Will rolled his eyes. Celsius snapped her head towards Simon, he shivered, she walked up to him.

"What's wrong Celsius?" Claus asked, thinking that it's rather unusual for her to take an interest in a pacifist like Simon.

"Who might you be?" She asked the boy.

"I … I'm S-Simon …" Introduced Simon, voice shaky. She smiled before Claus commanded her to return. She disappeared.

"Sorry about that kid, it seems that she's taken up an interest in you. Anyway, you now know that the spirits can control nature. We should rest now." Once Simon and Will fell asleep Claus summoned Celsius again.

"Yes master?" "I want to know Celsius, why have you taken up an interest in Simon?" Claus asked. "

I'm sorry master, I just became curious. There was something about him that seemed familiar." Stated Celsius, bowing her head.

XXX

The next morning, before dawn the three started climbing the mountain, Simon noticed that he was having a hard time breathing. He figured that he couldn't already be tired since he started climbing not that long ago. He noticed that Will and Claus' breathing became harder as they got higher up the mountains. It became especially noticeable once they got past the tree line. The wind became stronger as they got closer to the summit it made the inside of Simon's ears hurt. Claus warned him to be careful as they got higher up because the slopes are slippery. Just after when he said that, Simon slipped , but he was able to maintain balance, he slipped a few more times as they got higher.

They stopped at an indent in the mountain which lead to a giant stone slab with writing on it. Claus pulled out a dictionary of sorts and flipped through it, then looking up at the slab. He put the dictionary away and pulled out a ring with a reddish gem on it. He inserted the into an impression in the wall and took it out. The stone slab slowly slid down and flames lit up the entrance hall. The three walked in.

"I wonder how the humans of the time were able to activate all these flames …" Will wondered to himself. Further down the hall it became darker, Will lit up a lantern. They saw skeletons and corpses that looked like they might still have a layer of dry wrinkly skin on them. They could see the bodies that looked like they were cut open and snapped bones that had dried blood stained on them. Dried blood stained the walls. There were smeared handprints below the characters Simon couldn't make out below figures that looked like a men with wings. The smeary hand prints were also on top of the writing and the drawing. Streaks and pools of dried blood nearly painted the floor. Simon gasped out of horror.

"Just like in Celsius's tomb." Hissed Claus. Will examined the skeletons and the floor.

"It looks like the people started killing each other then maybe afterwords they might have started eating each other." He concluded.

"But why?" Simon muttered to himself.

"Curse our kings, curse the divine ones, curse the angels, curse god's children …" Claus read on the walls. "Even the writing is similar … curse the spirits, curse the builders, curse Yggdrasil for creating those wretched beings. Descenders … Descenders Descenders burn for sins, come here so we can feast on your flesh. Let us gouge out your heart, hope you're alive when you watch us drink its blood and when we rip out your wings and hang them on our walls. Curse you curse you curse you. May you, descender, have your entrails removed while you're awake. Let us feast on them, let us feast on them! …"

"What happened?" Simon asked shivering.

"From what we gathered from the writing on the walls, the wars of the apocalypse period were caused by descenders, who are also dubbed as god's children. After the period we don't hear much about descenders, except about the descender, Mary, from two thousand years ago." Explained Claus.

_"Foolish boy in our territory."_ Simon heard a voice say, he turned to see nothing behind him.

"We should get going." Ordered Claus.

"Simon, we'll be seeing more of this further down the hall, if you're uncomfortable with this I suggest you stay near the entrance." Will warned.

"I have a job to do, I can't run away from something like this." He told Will.

He then turned when he heard someone laugh: _"Stupid stupid boy." _

They continued down the halls of the temple and they saw much of the same thing. Simon wondered why Claus and Will weren't hearing the voices that were laughing and taunting him. He figured that he should ignore them, it would make the job easier if he ignored the voices. He shivered at random intervals even though the temple was much warmer than outside. He felt disapproving glares on him. They would stop every once in a while, so the two men can take some note and collect research material. The voices Simon heard stopped completely once they approached a room with a very high ceiling, an altar with a locked coffin on it was in the center of the room. Claus approached the lock muttered something and the lock broke and the coffin snapped open. There was a flash of light and a creature with two heads, a bird head and a lizard head appeared, it looked like a crazy alchemist spliced together a bird and some reptile.

"I am Aska." Said both heads at the same time, "The one who watches the world in the day, for what have you disturbed me for?"

"My name is Claus F. Lester, I wish to form a pact with you!" Demanded Claus.

"A pact?" Said the lizard head.

"Very well, you may form a pact but only if you can prove your strength!" challenged the bird head. Aska flew up stopping before he could hit his head on the ceiling.

"Here he comes! Simon try to get close to him!" Claus ordered.

"Yes sir!" Replied Simon running up to the altar then jumping up trying to slash Aska but he missed by a mile.

"Photon!" Aska shouted a blast of light hit Simon, slamming him into the ground.

"Healing power come! First Aid!" Will Chanted, Simon's wounds were instantly healed and he sprung back to his feet and used demon fang while Claus summoned Celsius.

"Celsius! Get Aska!" Claus ordered. Celsius obeyed, assisting Simon by casting ice spells, causing Aska to crash to the ground, Simon ran up and slashed him with his sword. Once Aska got up Simon jumped up and gave Aska an upward slash followed by a downward slash.

_'Wait … this attack …'_ he thought, realizing that it looked oddly familiar.

"Holy Lance!" Aska shouted, blades of light appeared and impaled the party, minus Celsius.

"Will heal us!" Claus ordered. Simon swallowed an apple gel to heal some of his wounds.

"Freeze lancer!" Celsius shouted, blades of ice shot at Aska.

"Demon fang!" Simon shouted but the attack missed. Simon and Celsius ran up to Aska. Will used first aid on Simon then did the same thing with Claus and himself. Celsius jumped up and punched Aska several times over and Simon jumped and used his new attack, tiger blade, on him. Aska's bird head tried to peck Simon but he blocked the attack, but the lizard head bit his leg then threw him against the wall.

"You okay kid?" Claus asked.

"I'm fine!" Replied Simon, rubbing his shoulder then running back up to Aska.

"Lightning!" Will shouted, a bolt came down and struck Aska, Simon jumped up and used tiger blade again then Will used the spell fire storm, trapping Aska in a vortex of flames for a time. Celsius used freeze lancer again and Simon landed a few more slashes on him. Will also casted freeze lancer followed by stone bast then fire storm. Simon got thrown around and impaled with holy lance before Celsius dealt the finishing blow. Simon collapsed after the fight breathing heavily, Will went up to him and healed his wounds. Celsius disappeared when Claus ordered her to return. Aska got back up, as if he hadn't been hurt at all.

"You have proven your strength, now do you have the topaz ring?" Aska asked. Claus pulled out the ring that he used at the entrance. "Let us form the pact." A light glowed from the ring and Aska seemed to be absorbed into the ring.

"Can you stand kid?" Said Claus.

"Um … yeah … I'll be fine." Said Simon.

The trip down the mountain was just as hard as trip up, Simon had a hard time walking down the mountain. He nearly slid down the mountain. By the time they got back it was just as dark as when they started out, it was already the next day, since the trains ran for a full 24 hours, they took the train ride back to St. Gabriel. Simon was out like a light once they got a seat.

"Rough day for him today." Said Claus, filling out the evaluation.

"He's still young so something like this is overwhelming for a boy like him." Said Will. "Besides, he's a very inexperienced fighter so fighting Aska was tough for him. Hell, he would have been killed if we weren't there."

"That's a good point." Stated Claus. They were silent for the rest of the train ride. It was already the next day when they arrived in St. Gabriel. Will made sure Simon got back to the inn, while Claus went to sleep after sticking a sac containing ten thousand gald in Simon's pocket and putting Simon's evaluation on his desk.

When Simon woke up it was past noon so he ran to guild's building only to remember that he did all twenty jobs so he stopped himself and figured that he should look around St. Gabriel. He had breakfast, or rather, lunch at a small coffee shop and paid with some of the money he found in his pocket. He bumped into Kanonno who he noticed that she's wearing something different, as opposed to the overalls she normally wears. This time she wore a button up shirt, a vest, rolled up pants, stripped stockings and heeled shoes.

"Hey where have you been?" She asked.

"Mountain climbing." He said bluntly.

"I see, Robin was freaking out yesterday wondering where you've been." She explained.

"Oh … He's gonna murder me during training." He mused. "By the way, did you do some shopping yesterday?"

"Nope, I had this change since my normal clothes are being washed at the river." She said.

"Huh …" Said Simon, noticing that St. Gabriel was sunny, for once. "Kanonno, can I travel with you to Cademeca?"

"What about the guild?" She asked.

"Well, I'm not an official part of the guild yet." Said Simon. "

In any case you should stick around until you get your results. If you get rejected, then knock yourself out." She said. "Okay, I will." Said Simon. That night he got a letter from the guild, he knew that Robin had been accepted into the guild.

The letter read: _To: Simon We appreciate that you applied but we are sorry to tell you that you did not make it into the guild. Sincerely, Ad Libitum._

**XXX**

**Leave it to Claus to take all the credit while Simon does all the work, not too far from what he did in Phantasia when you first meet him. In any case sorry if this chapter went on longer than it should, I just wanted to get this arc over with so some of the fun stuff happens. If you found the temple a little disturbing well it's going to reappear. To keep in mind, Robin uses a bo-staff and he knows sword rain, note, Xillia's Leia also wields a bo-staff and she knows sword rain, so don't please don't complain about it. Also, I'm using the Eternia model of Celsius while I made up the models for the other spirits, minus Muse from Xillia. Yes I'm putting in characters from all tales games thus far, including Radiant Mythology and Summoner's Lineage (Well … Radiant Mythology is kind of obvious because I'm basing this fan fiction off of it). I'm not doing Nakiri Dungeon and I'm debating if I should put in Tempest and Dawn of the New Radiant Freeze for reviewing so anyone else who's reading this please review, and if you have any criticisms, criticize away! This chapter is very much rushed.  
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	10. Chapter 10: Ad Libitum's Cademeca Branch

Chapter 10: Ad Libitum's Cademeca branch

**Last Time Simon got to learn about spirits and got rejected from the guild. This time he joins Kanonno and he learns about her alcoholism. Also the guild gets a surprise visit.**

Simon went up to his room and gathered his things.

"Where are you going?" He heard, he turned to see Robin in the doorway.

"Well I got rejected from Ad Libitum, and I sort of promised Kanonno that I would travel with her if I got rejected." Simon explained.

"You don't have to you know." Said Robin.

"I know, but since I'm likely not gonna get a job that's not gonna kill me, I might as well look somewhere else." Said Simon, _'Besides, Siela's been bugging me about going back to Sakriny for a while now.' _

"Are you gonna at least stay long enough to meet some members from the Cademeca branch?" Robin asked.

"I don't know when we'll be going, so, probably, I'm just going to be living somewhere else until then." Said Simon, "Why is the Cademeca branch coming?"

"I heard a rumor there's gonna be some conference between the leaders of the three superpowers coming up soon and well we might just be able to meet up with other guild members." He shrugged.

"Why?"

"I dunno, to protect the leaders I guess."

"Then why wouldn't those leaders use their own personal body guards?" Simon asked, bring up a very good point.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot that they had their body guards, especially the president of Cademeca. I heard that they almost never leave his side." Noted Robin.

"Which makes the guild thing a groundless rumor." Concluded Simon, leaving the room. "Take care, though I'm probably gonna see you roaming around the city doing jobs. Oh and don't get too overwhelmed by your sisters, it gives you red eyes and what not."

"Gee thanks." Growled Robin, "But don't act like this is good bye, you're not leaving yet, and you can stay here for a few days."

"No thanks, I don't want to feel like I'm mooching off of anyone." Claimed Simon, gong down the stairs, Robin following him. "So I'll see you tomorrow maybe?"

"Fine." He sighed rolling his eyes as Simon left the door. It started raining again, he got soaked fairly quickly he ran into Marianya and Laurel wondering where he should go now.

"Oh, Simon, how are you? Are your allergies acting up?" Laurel asked.

"Well I got rejected from the guild and I don't live at the inn anymore. I did ask Kanonno if I could go with you guys if I got rejected from the guild, she said yes." Explained Simon. "My allergies aren't acting up at the moment Laurel."

"Oh really?" Questioned Marianya rubbing her chin, glaring at Simon.

"Well … yeah … she said: "Knock yourself out" if I get rejected." Stated Simon, "A-and she was completely sober last I checked."

"And how long ago was this?"

"A few hours ago." Stated Simon.

"Never thought you'd be the type to rush into things." She murmured to herself. "At least we're not leaving like tonight or tomorrow other wise I'd kill her."

"Mari Mari Mari …" Laurel sighed to herself shaking her head. "Keep in mind that we don't have a plan for traveling and he could help. Now we have to get Kanonno out of the bar before she gets carried away."

"Fine …" Groaned Marianya she walked off Simon followed her to a bar where Kanonno ranted to a bartender about Reltih or something like that.

"Ya know da worse part? We don't gedda goddamn wage! How da heller we gonna pay da mortgage!"

"Kanonno …" Began Marianya.

"Waddya want Mari?" Snapped Kanonno. "I'm try'n ta gedda a conversation."

"You've had quite enough, we're going." Ordered Laurel, "Mari, grab her." Marianya lifted her off the chair from behind. Simon rubbed his eyes because Laurel was near by.

"It's for your own good Kanonno." Said Marianya.

"Am still sober!" Kanonno shouted squirming in Marianya's arms and digging her heels into the ground.

"Hey Simon, can you grab her legs?"Marianya asked. Simon nodded and picked up her legs, at the knees.

"Le'go!" Kanonno screamed trying to kick Simon, though she did succeed in jerking him around as he and Marianya carried her out of the bar. Simon let go of her legs once they were away from the bar, though Marianya still held Kanonno firmly.

"Wha' was dat for? Am sober, really!" Kanonno protested.

"Kanonno, you have a problem, you need to stop." Advised Laurel.

"In all honesty … this is just pitiful." Stated Simon.

"Ah won't stop and who cares wha'cha think." Kanonno spat.

"Why am I not surprised?" sighed Marianya, dragging Kanonno to the shelter. "If talking to her would make her stop when she started."

They were quiet to the shack closer to the outskirts of the city, except for Kanonno who was complaining and squirming. Simon wondered why no one tried to stop her from going to the bar in the first place, he felt a little sick with the feeling that something bad might happen if something isn't done about her alcoholism.

"I'll go get the laundry, Mari, will you come with me?" Laurel offered once they got to the shelter.

"What about-" Marianya began.

"We can leave that to Simon." Stated Laurel, Marianya let go of Kanonno to join Laurel. Simon was surprised that Kanonno didn't dash back to the bar once Marianya let go.

"What?" She hissed.

"N-nothing, I just thought that you'd go back to the bar."

"Why bother, I'm back here against my will, too late to go back now." She growled, pushing open the door. The shack looked homier than it did outside, it at least it had some furniture and there were some spider webs hanging down and leaks in the roof. At least it had a fireplace and a wood burning stove.

"You live here?" Simon asked.

"We figured that we'd be taking up space at the shelter for the people who really need it. This place has been abandoned for years so I don't think anyone would mind if we use it for a little while." Explained Kanonno.

"I got rejected from the guild." Said Simon, changing the subject.

"I figured, why else would you be here instead of guild residence?"

"Right." Sighed Simon. "So … what are we going to do about traveling?"

"Dunno, pro'ly gonna try to bribe a guy to forge passports." Shrugged Kanonno, "How much do you have?"

"A little under 10,000 gald, but why do you want to want to forge passports and why are you traveling?" Simon asked.

"We're traveling to Cademeca because we know someone who lives there and he might be able to find us a place. Though we can't get to Cademeca without a visa or a passport. Since getting a passport is easier than a visa we thought we could find someone to forge us passports." Kanonno explained. "Though with 10,000 plus gald I doubt we could convince 'im." That's when Marianya and Laurel came in with the so few clothes they had. Laurel kept his distance from Simon so that she doesn't trigger his allergies.

"Sobered up Kanonno?" Marianya asked.

"Still buzzed but I guess I won't get a hangover tomorrow." She shrugged. "I was just explaining Simon about our plan to get someone to forge passports."

"Ah, yes, unfortunately I heard it takes at least a hundred thousand gald to create an authentic fake passport." Sighed Laurel.

"Hm…" Simon mumbled while rubbing his chin. Then he stared up to the ceiling and snapped his fingers until he finally spoke. "I heard this rumor today, it may be groundless, but they say that guild members from the Cademeca branch of Ad Libitum may be visiting Speg's branch. If it's true maybe we can sneak into their luggage and get to Cademeca that way."

"Good idea, but we can't use that until we're sure that there are guild members are coming." Stated Marianya. "Depending on said guild's mode of transportation it could be between a couple of weeks to three months. By then we might be already gone. For now let's try to look for ways to get the hundred thousand plus gald needed to bribe a counterfeit artist."

"I could try to get a job." Simon offered.

"Mari and I can get our fair share of money so you trying to get a job or something could really help us." Said Kanonno.

XXX

Two weeks passed and Simon had no such luck in getting a job. He was still in touch with Robin and asked him frequently about any errands he could run for Ad Libitum. Though that always ended with a "Sorry Simon, no can do." Then he would ask if he could watch his sisters, the response was a laugh. One day he was looking at shops, primarily shop windows to see if there was a "help wanted" signs. He heard a "Whoosh" he looked up to see a strange ship of sorts with engines, propellers and wings, the ship looked more like a bird than a ship. The craft would've made a noticeable shadow if it weren't raining. He kept an eye on the craft and ran after it he followed it to an area of flat ground just outside the city that soldiers surrounded. Though there was a hole of the area the soldiers didn't patrol which was across from where he was. The craft landed dead center of the platform. A door opened at the side of the ship.

"Hey you!" A soldier shouted, spotting him, Simon shivered, "What are you doing here? There are no civilians allowed."

"Ah! I'm sorry! I saw this aircraft and I wanted to go check it out. I didn't know this area was restricted!" Simon cried.

"Are you lying?" The soldier asked, pointing a gun at Simon.

"I'm not, I honestly didn't know that this was restricted!" Said Simon, staring at the gun.

"What's going on here?" He heard a woman ask. Simon looked up to see a young woman with short blond hair wearing a white dress under a blue corset and jacket. She also had a belt with a pistol in it and a cape protecting her from the rain. Behind her was a young woman with black hair wearing a blue jacket and hat and black pants, and two red headed teenagers, one had his hair tied back into a ponytail and goggles pushed back his bangs, the other's hair was short with some hairs sticking up and had goggles above his forehead. The long haired one wore a long coat over another jacket, while the other one wore a cape over his grey shirt, pants and brownish red vest, both wore gloves.

"Mam, we found a trespasser on military territory, he could be a spy." Stated the soldier.

"He's not a spy." Defended the short haired red head. "He …" He then couldn't think of anything. The long haired red head sighed.

"He's with us." The long haired red head continued. His party looked at him with shock. "He's our escort, he's making sure we at least got to St. Gabriel safely."

"But he said he didn't know that civilians aren't allowed." The soldiers argued.

"He's lying, he tends to do that under pressure."

"Very well, but, I see you here without them …" Warned the soldier making a slashing motion across his neck.

"Yes sir!" Replied Simon with a salute.

Once they were within city limits Simon thanked them for helping him out. "I'm sorry if I caused you any trouble." Apologized Simon

"Hey, no problem. We're just glad that the soldiers didn't kill you on our account." Said the short haired red head.

"Don't do it again." Grumbled the long haired red head.

"I'm sorry … I won't." He apologized again sweating and shaking because of the red head's glare.

"It's quite all right." Said the blonde.

"We don't have time to waste, we need to get to the guild." The black haired girl reminded.

"The guild? If you want I can show you how to get there." Simon offered, "Though … what are you doing with the guild?"

"That's confidential, and we can figure out where the guild is." Stated the long haired red head, starting to walk off while the short haired red head grabbed his shoulder.

"Hey hold on, we could use him." He said.

"No."

"This is our first time to St. Gabriel, we'll get lost eventually."

"We'll get a map."

"Calm down you two!" The blonde demanded. "Asch, Luke's right, this is our first time in St. Gabriel and the guild would be angry if we're late. He could show us around the city."

"Consider this as pay back for helping me out with the soldiers." Said Simon.

"Fine." Sighed the long haired red head. Simon lead the four to the guild, once he remembered his location.

"By the way, what's your name?" The blonde asked Simon.

"Simon." He introduced. "What about you?" he asked slowing down his pace so he can get a decent conversation.

"I'm Natalia, and this here is Chloe." She said pointing her head towards the black haired girl.

"I'm Luke fon Fabre." Introduced the short haired red head.

"Asch fon Fabre." Said the long haired red head.

Simon gave a smile then asked Luke, "Are you and Asch twins?"

"Well yeah, Asch is the older twin and I'm the younger one." Said Luke as if it was obvious. Simon turned pink from asking such a stupid question.

"Oh … well I … I um … sorry." He said his face turning red, "This is the first time I've met twins … I mean … I'm sure that there are other sets of twins in the city but the city's so big that-"

"That's enough!" Snapped Asch, "You're making an idiot out of yourself." Simon stopped, minus the noise of daily life the group was dreadfully quiet.

"So … you're not from around here are you?" He asked, breaking the ice.

"Gee, I wonder what gave that away? Was it the airship?" Said Asch rolling his eyes.

"Figures. Cademeca I suppose?" he asked.

"Yes, how did you know?" Chloe asked.

"I keep hearing rumors about guild members from Cademeca, also 'Fabre' sounds like the name of a political family from Cademeca." He shrugged, remembering a conversation a week ago between Kanonno and Marianya over whether the president of Cademeca is truly ruling the country. Of course Kanonno was a little drunk which caused her to think that the Fabre family is really behind the presidency, since they were apparently in the cabinet since the republic was established over 150 years ago. The conversation got very political and ugly. It ended with Kanonno saying something about Marianya's mother and burlesque, and Marianya saying something about Kanonno's hairy legs.

"I'm impressed, you've heard of us." Said Asch. "But you do know that there are Fabres in Speg somewhere." Simon fell silent he felt like he might say something stupid.

"How long will you be staying?" He asked.

"A week." Stated Luke, Asch looked over to him. "What? There's no harm in telling how long we'll stay." Asch gave a frustrated sigh and that was the last thing anyone had said.

XXX

When Simon finally lead them to 108 Gates Street he opened the door for them as a gesture to be polite. Claus looked up from his paperwork.

"Hey kid, I thought you didn't make it into the guild." Said Claus with a smirk.

"I was just showing these four the way to the guild. I was just leaving." Said Simon, just as Simon closed the door Claus dropped the pen at the sight of the blonde woman.

"Wait a minute, aren't you the president's daughter, Natalia?" He questioned. Simon closed the door and leaned against it.

"Why yes I am." She stated. He heard Claus scramble out of his desk.

"It's a pleasure to meet you miss, My name is Claus F. Lester, I'm the vice president of Speg's Ad Libitum branch."

"Please, don't be so formal, I'm not here on presidential business I'm actually here representing Ad Libitum Cademeca.

"Eavesdropping I presume?" He heard a voice, he turned to see Kratos not too far behind him, and judging from the dirt on him, he just got back from a job. "You should know that any guild business is strictly between guild members."

"S-sorry, I was just leaving." Said Simon jogging away from the guild's building.

"By the way," said Kratos making Simon stop in his tracks, "you would've made it if your swordsmanship wasn't so sloppy." He stated, the criticism did hurt a little but there wasn't anything he could do about it since he hadn't been fighting in two weeks. He bowed and went on his way.

He looked around the city looking for help wanted posters when he heard clunks played in a pattern. He wandered to see where it came from it took him a while until he noticed he was close to it. He ran to the source. He found Marianya beating a pair of sticks on boxes, cans, jars, and what appeared to be vehicle parts and pipes arranged around her in a rhythmical fashion. She constantly switched from boxes to vehicle parts and so on, some times she would beat on two different items at the same time which would make the beats just sound like noise. She would continue for a moment until someone walked by and dropped some gald in, in which she would thank them and continue. She would also get a few watchers for a few minutes before they would either drop some money or just leave. She looked like a baby amusing herself with pots and pans until she tires out. He approached her.

"Um … hi." He greeted. She stopped and looked up.

"Finally got around to going to town square eh?" She asked. Simon looked around him with the several people around them going to the shops or other places around the area and some ways away there was a fountain.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"Trying to get money, what do you think I do all day?" She answered. Simon thought for a while but couldn't think of anything. "By the way, Kanonno is around here, though I don't know what she's doing. You could go look for her if you want."

"I can check on her later," shrugged Simon, "how did you get into this?"

"I dunno, I guess I just found amusement in banging on tables and walls, in fact, my mother would yell at me and tell me I was too old for that by the time I was seven." She laughed then she sniffed.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine." She said rubbing her eyes, "I just get a little chocked up when I remember my parents it's nothing."

"They died in Reltih's purge didn't they?" Simon asked, she nodded.

"They died when I was ten, I was very close to them, but since they were against Reltih, I would've guessed it was inevitable, fortunately I was spared." She explained. "Though I bet Kanonno might have it worse, though I shouldn't talk about it, but I figure that's one of the reasons why Kanonno started drinking two years ago."

"Any other reasons?"

"I think she was stressed about starting off in the work force and about the fact Pequist was disbanded about two years ago." She stated.

"Have you tried to stop her from drinking?"

"She lives with Laurel but nothing can be done since our supplies are sent with a bottle of vodka, and that gets sucked down by the end of the week sometimes within the first few day." She said. "It's really developed into a nasty habit. You know, someday she'll hurt someone because of her alcoholism."

"Have you tried giving her a different outlet?"

"She loves photography, but it's illegal to own a camera." Sighed Marianya, "In speaking of which now would be the time where she's going to get drunk at the bar."

"Are you two talking about me?" They heard and turned to see Kanonno besides them, "Wha'cha got Mari?"

"Well … about 50 gald, did you get anything?"

"Who says I was making money?" She asked.

"Then what were you doing?" Simon asked.

"I was talking to an old guy about photography, he couldn't let me take pictures out of his camera because the equipment takes too long to set up and it gets in the way. He gave me some pointers on how to get a good photo and did you know that you can develop film in color?" She rambled.

"I'm sure it was quite interesting." Said Marianya, thinking that it would be a long lecture on photography.

"You lost me at photography." Stated Simon.

"All right you guys are bored I'll stop. Anyway, that'll bring our gald total to 12050 gald … boy do we have a long way to go." She sighed.

"Maybe we don't have to get someone to forge passports …" Said Simon to himself.

"Did you say something Simon?" Marianya asked.

"I was just talking to myself. I was thinking … I ran into guild members from Cademeca today they came in the ship thingy that passed over the city today. I think it's at some landing platform." Simon explained.

"I got it!" Exclaimed Kanonno, "Simon, you come with me, Mari, just keep beating your trash."

"Excuse me?" Scolded Marianya.

"Sorry Mari keep trying to make money for us we might need a back up!" Said Kanonno dragging Simon with her. They ran through the streets of St. Gabriel, most of these places Simon had never seen before and he was pretty sure that they ran past the palace at least three times. The two stopped at some sort of small shop, probably for travel. Simon saw maps of the world hung up on the walls of the shop and monochromatic pictures of various destinations. Kanonno let go of him and started looking around the shop.

"What are we looking for?" He asked.

"A map of the area surrounding St. Gabriel." She answered. Simon looked around to see where the maps could be when he noticed that Kanonno was already looking at maps.

"You know … if we wanted a map we could've just gone to a place that stores books and the like." Said Simon picking out a random map and unfolding it and putting it back.

"If we went to a library we wouldn't be able to keep the maps much less draw on them." She Said doing the same thing.

"Also … how do you know this city?"

"I just got a map and memorized the streets." She stated, "It helped me get to work for the past few years back in Sakriny. Ah-ha!" She ran to the cashier, paid for the map then ran back to Simon. "C'mon, we might still be able to steal a few minutes from Mari." The two ran back to town square to see that Mari had already put away her "drum set." Simon looked up to see that the sun was going to set so the two headed back to the shack, when it was night. Marianya stood outside the shack along with Laurel.

"What took you two so long?" Marianya asked, "By the way I managed to make a total of 75 gald."

"We were getting a map." Said Kanonno holding up the folded paper once they got in and Marianya lit up the old fireplace.

"Let's see." Said Laurel. Kanonno unfolded the map, the four huddled over it, Simon rubbed his eyes.

"So Simon is this the landing platform you mentioned?" Kanonno asked pointing to a square outside of St. Gabriel labeled St. Gabriel military air craft port. Simon nodded, then followed it with a sneeze.

"Oh I'm sorry, I keep forgetting you're allergic." Said Laurel backing away from him.

"It's okay, I keep forgetting as well." Stated Simon rubbing an eye.

"Anyway," Said Kanonno getting them back on topic, "It looks like we'll be able to sneak into the port just by walking in."

"Don't do it." Stated Simon.

"Why not?" Marianya asked raising an eyebrow.

"There are guards everywhere I would've gotten killed if the guild members didn't bail me out." He said.

"I see … we could hide in the guild's-" Kanonno began.

"They didn't have any luggage as far as I can see well at the moment." Simon interrupted.

"Is there any weakness to the port's security?" Kanonno asked.

"Well, there, for some reason, weren't any guards right here." He said pointing to the area behind the base that said: "Relop Forest."

"So we'll sneak into the port the day before the guild leaves. We'll go from the north exit and sneak into Relop forest we should make it to the port by the time they leave." Kanonno suggested. "Now we just have to figure out the time." The two women and female cat looked at Simon.

"What?"

"Hey Simon, though you're not in the guild, you can still befriend guild members right?" Said Kanonno with a mischievous grin.

"Of course, you've seen how I've interacted with Ro-" He began, "What are you getting at Kanonno?"

"What if you befriended one of the guild members and got the time out of him, then we can leave at least 24 hours before hand?" Theorized Marianya.

"So you mean spy on them."

"Well not so much spy, just forcing yourself to befriend a guild member to get one piece of information, one _minor_ piece." Said Kanonno, "It's so obsolete that know one would know nor care." Simon gave her a raised eyebrow then sighed.

"Fine … I'll see what I can do."

**XXX**

**Never thought I would finish a chapter so soon boy I have a problem/fetish/obsession with corsets and vests I bet you can make a drinking game off of the "Steampunk" fashion nonsense you've read in here though I don't recommend it. So … please give me your thoughts, I'm always open for criticism. Oh yeah! Before I forget, I did change Luke's and Asch's story a bit, well instead of the Duke's son, they're part of an influencial political family, and they're twins, like in Radiant Mythology instead of replica and original. This is mostly because I wouldn't know how to fit in clones and I didn't plan for Asch to be part of some religious order. Luke being the younger twin made more sense to me than him being the older twin like in Radiant Mythology 3 because Luke was originally created seven years after therefore he's younger than Asch. I probably stop talking about this. So yeah, any two people that happen to look alike will either be related or its just a coincidence.**


	11. Chapter 11: How To Make New Friends

Chapter 11: How to go about making new friends

_ Simon was in Aska's temple at the entrance hall holding a lantern. He looked down to the dead bodies and shivered he continued down the hall but something grabbed his ankle. He turned around to see a skeleton's hand around his ankle. He shook it off, flipping the corpse. He continued down the hall then he felt something grab his ankle again, he looked down to see the same skeleton at his ankle._

_ 'How did that get there?' He thought to himself kneeling down. The skeleton snapped its skull up and it grabbed his wrists._

_ "Welcome prey welcome!" It said. Simon shrieked and pushed it back but it caused the other skeletons to snap their heads and crawl towards him. The skeletons right behind him grabbed his shoulders and the back of his shirt._

_ "Cursed one cursed one." Some said._

_ "Food …" Others said. One of the skeletons took a bone and stabbed it into Simon's leg. He screamed in pain as another bit off some skin on his arm only for it to fall through the cavity where a tongue used to be._

Simon snapped awake and sat up panting on the cold floor. He then sighed to himself and curled up into a fetal position.

_'Oh thank god, that was only a dream.'_ He thought. He heard a moan and turned his head to Kanonno.

"Mommy …" She groaned. He lay back down onto his jacket and went back to sleep hoping that he wouldn't get another nightmare.

_ He was in a dark floating space again, a place that seemed all too familiar by now._

_ "What do you want now Siela?" He sighed._

_ "You returning to Sakriny. Also, you should try making some new friends other than the ones you hang out with. It won't kill you, unless if who you're trying to be friends with are insane." She said. "May I suggest making friends with a summoner?"_

_ "Why would you want me to make friends when you've been begging me to go back to Sakriny? Why do you want me back anyway."_

_ "As I told you several times, returning to Sakriny is your duty, and you have a short life, you might as well spend it with other people."_

_ "But what exactly is my duty? Its not like I'm made to know what exactly I'm supposed to do!" Shouted Simon. Siela looked shocked._

_ "This could be a problem …" She muttered to herself, she looked up to him and stated "You'll find out in due time."_

He woke up to see that it was already morning to see Marianya and Laurel were gone and Kanonno was still asleep. Simon assumed that they were making breakfast like every morning since he'd been there, he would do the dishes and on occasion would help them. They also made dinner though it partially what ever they didn't eat during breakfast, just had any bites in the food cut out. He crawled over to Kanonno and shook her.

"Kanonno." He whispered, shaking her harder until she moaned and slowly opened her eyes.

"What do you want Simon?" She growled.

"I'm just telling you that breakfast is going to be ready soon." He reminded.

"Tell me when it's actually ready." She mumbled going back to sleep.

"Why must you be such a difficult person to wake?" He sighed.

"Kanonno! Breakfast!" Laurel shouted not too long after, Kanonno shot up and ran into the musty old kitchen, or half a kitchen. Simon followed her. In the tight room Marianya handed Simon a hard boiled egg chopped onto the piece of toast. He looked over to Kanonno, scarfing the thing.

"Wha?" She asked, then gulping the bread and egg.

"Kanonno, how many times do I have to tell you don't talk with your mouth full and don't shove so much into your mouth, you'll choke!" Laurel scolded.

"Gee Laurel do you always have to be such a stiff?" asked Kanonno, shoving the rest of her toast into her mouth.

"Manners are important Kanonno, the basis of society runs on them!" Laurel shouted.

"Ah-" Kanonno began.

"Don't talk until you've swallowed everything." Laurel reminded, "I swear eight years with the guild is a bad influence."

"Marianya has been with the guild for about the same time, if not longer and she turned into the "proper lady" you wanted." Kanonno argued after gulping down the bread and egg.

"Are you insane? She eats like a rappig and she's not the least bit concerned for the biggest duty of her life, marrying a great husband and raising a family!" She claimed.

"Like you should talk, you've never married!" Kanonno spat.

"She's right, no man can take your fancy. Besides, now a days a woman can't support herself off her husband's money, and weddings are expensive." Marianya stated, "It would be nice to have a family but now it just seems … inconvenient."

"I'm sorry … but I don't understand what you're talking about or why Marianya said that Laurel doesn't have any interest in men … I mean she's a cat, why would she be interested in a man and not males of her species?" Simon asked.

"This is … girl talk, it's understandable that you don't understand, boys simply don't care about these things until later in life." Laurel explained.

"Mari didn't mean she never liked human men … let's just say … she doesn't … like any male." Kanonno stated.

"Well why not?" Simon stated, the girls looked at each other and laughed nervously.

"Well … my would you look at the time! I best be going!" Said Marianya running out the door, not finishing her breakfast.

"Don't you have some spying to do?" Kanonno scolded.

"Hey don't change the subject!" Simon Shouted.

"We'll tell you later, Bye now!" Laurel shouted back nudging Simon out of the room.

"Okay?" Simon said confused, leaving the room, putting on his shoes, grabbing his sword and jacket, and getting out of the house. Kanonno and Laurel were left alone.

"You're not going to tell him that are you?" Said Kanonno.

"It's unacceptable Kanonno, you should know that." Said Laurel.

"What am I going to do about this … "Friend" thing?" Simon thought out loud going on another job hunt. _'Asch seems unapproachable, Natalia maybe, but Chloe and Asch both seem awfully protective of her. Chloe? I don't know maybe if I can get her alone … no … I guess that would leave …'_ He bumped into someone.

"Hey watch it!" They shouted.

"Sorry I-" Apologized Simon, turning around to see it was Luke. "Luke?"

"You're the guy from yesterday, Simon is it?" He asked.

_'Perfect!'_ Simon thought wrapping his arm around Luke and pat him, "Luke buddy! How've ya been?"

"Fine … until now." He said.

"What's been troubling you good ol' pal?" Simon asked, squeezing his shoulder.

"You being too friendly. I mean I've only known you for a day and … well … anyone can figure out that you're an introvert." Luke said bluntly.

"Pish posh! Only for a day!"

"One of the guild members told me that you are awkward … very awkward." Stated Luke.

"Sorry …" Stated Simon letting go of Luke, "I was just trying to make friends … so far it hasn't been working out."

"If that's what you were trying to do then why didn't you ask if we could do something?" Suggested Luke.

"Um … okay … do you want to do something?" Simon asked.

"Now was that so hard?" Luke teased, "I'm free today, what do you want to do?"

"Well … what do you like doing?" Simon asked, since he doesn't have very many interests.

"I do practice sword fighting." Stated Luke.

"Great! Can you help me? I'm bad at sword fighting and self defense, I'm constantly the worry." Stated Simon over exaggerating the fact that the only time he worried a healer was one time.

"Okay, but I doubt that you're bad enough to cause healers to loose sleep."

"Well … I've been told that I fight worse than some people's mothers. And I'm rusty." Shivered Simon remembering Kanonno, Marianya, Robin, Robin's sisters, and _**Laurel **_telling him multiple times that their mothers fight better than him.

"That bad huh? I'll go get my sword at the inn, wait here." Said Luke running off. Simon stared up into the sky, for quite a while, he was beginning to think that Luke had ditched him.

"Well what are you doing here?" He heard someone say, he looked up to see that it was Robin.

"Robin? I haven't seen you for the past few days." He said.

"Well I've been doing a job down south and it took longer than I thought." Explained Robin, "What 'cha spacing out about?"

"Have you met the guild members from Cademeca?"

"Yeah?"

"Well … I've been trying to make friends with one of them and I think I scared him off." He explained.

"Which one's this?"

"Luke."

"The short haired red head?"

"Yes."

"Oh, I've seen him, he just got a little bit lost to whatever inn he's staying at." Robin said, "He doesn't seem like the type who would go back on promises. What were you going to do with him anyway?"

"Well he was going to help me with sword fighting. Would you like to join?" Simon invited.

"I'd love to, but I have to run some errands for my family." Robin turned down, "Thanks for the offer though." Robin left, and not long after Luke came in running with a sword attached to his belt.

"Do you know any places we can train?" Luke asked.

"Well there's this clearing I know of, we can go there." Said Simon.

"Great! Lead the way."

XXX

In the clearing outside of St. Gabriel Luke encouraged Simon to show him what he knows with a sparing match. Simon drew his sword and charged at him but Luke dodged. Simon's slashes and thrusts would be either dodged or parried, the only strike ares he knew were also blocked. Luke easily disarmed him.

"I think I know what your problem is." Said Luke, Simon quirked an eyebrow, "You're using the wrong weapon! This sword is not for you, you'd be better off using pistols!" Simon's eyes widened then he rubbed his chin and thought the possibility over.

"I was kidding about the pistol part, but you should probably consider long range fighting if you want. Seriously though, with the type of sword you're using you should rely more on speed. You'll break the thing if you're aggressive with it. Also, you should probably stop holding your hilt with both hands. Your parries were slow and poorly executed, you're footwork is a mess and you move like a sloth." Luke criticized, "Whoever compares you to their mother were right to do so!" Simon could have sworn he felt his heart stop as Luke threw insults at his "Technique." "Let's take it from the top!" Luke ordered. Simon grabbed his sword and the two went back with practice, Luke would throw criticisms whenever Simon did something, though they were more like shouted reminders. After a while they stopped and Luke suggested that they'd take a break. They sat under some trees to keep them dry from the sprinkling rain.

"How do you know so much about sword fighting Luke?" Simon asked.

"I don't know that much, I'm sure Asch knows more than I do, he's been studying swordsmanship longer than I have." Luke claimed. "I didn't start until seven years ago for self defense."

"Really …" The two sat there for a while.

"Do you have any pets?" Simon finally asked out of the blue.

"Huh?"

"I'm sorry, it was just so quiet I just wanted to bring up some topic-" Explained Simon before Luke stopped him.

"You're not too good at socializing are you?" Luke asked, Simon shook his head. "Don't worry about it, things like that take a while."

"Thanks Luke." Sighed Simon, "I don't know what it is I feel so comfortable around Kanonno and Marianya but I feel so nervous around you, Robin, and just about everyone else."

"Like I said, it takes a while." Luke repeated. "And to answer that pet question, Asch and I own a cheagle."

"Ah … what's a cheagle?"

"Seriously?" Said Luke giving him a disappointed look.

"What's a cheagle?" Simon asked again, Luke sighed and shook his head.

"They're a sort of wild animal that can be trained to be a popular pet among the upper class. You should be able to find them in most forests around the world or abandoned on the streets." Explained Luke. "Wanna find one?"

"What about training?" Simon asked.

"Fine, but one of these days we should go cheagle hunting." Said Luke with a smirk. The two continued their sword fighting with Luke telling him what to do whenever he did something wrong. They were interrupted by Asch.

"So this is where you've been all day. What could possibly be so important that you have to skip escorting Natalia to the king? You know the president expects her to get there safely!" he scolded.

"She has bodyguards and can fend for herself." Argued Luke.

"Idiot! Have you considered that there could be snipers on the roof?"

"That's not gonna happen. As far as St. Gabriel knows the airship yesterday was a military flight. They're not going to know Natalia's here."

"Was this an important day?" Simon interrupted, "I'm sorry … Luke told me that he was off today."

"Oh you thought you were off today huh?" Said Asch sarcastically.

"Natalia was gone and the guild was off what else would I assume?" Luke claimed.

"You could oh … I don't know ... caught up with us instead of running off." Asch pointed out. "This is an important job for our branch of the guild!"

"Why is it so important?"

"Guys you really should stop." Simon interrupted again "It's raining and its gonna get worse. I don't know about you but I don't want to get drenched!" He ran back to the city and got into the nearest building. The atmosphere was quite relaxing with a radio playing an old classic and the smell of home cooking. He saw two little girls paying with a doll.

"Mommy!" One of them cried. Simon and ran back into the rain. He then went into another building, it also had screaming kids in it as well, though it felt familiar to him.

"Oh hello Simon." He looked up to see Lediemn at the front desk with one of Robin's sisters, a toddler with blue hair named Oriole. She was throwing a fit and tugging on Lediemn's hair. "Did you- ow! Stop that!" She shouted ripping the child's hands out of her hair. Oriole started crying, Simon went up to her picked her up and held her like she was a time bomb, which made her cry more. "You and Robin practically lived together and yet you still don't know how to handle his younger sisters."

"Well Phoebe and Wren are usually out of my way, Finch follows suit. Never seen much of Oriole." Said Simon honestly.

"I see … what are you doing here?"

"I'm just seeking shelter from the rain for a bit." Said Simon, "How are Robin and his family doing?"

"His father recently got a job and they're probably gonna get out of here and rent an apartment or something soon."

"Isn't that nice."

"And thanks to you and them this inn can afford some small renovations." Lediemn grinned. "Plan to stay longer so we can get rid of our roach problem and fix our plumbing?"

"Tempting but no thanks, I'll be leaving the country soon."

"Hopefully after the conference."

"What conference?"

"If you don't know there have been tensions between Speg and Sakriny, rumor has it that they may be on the brink of war. However, Cademeca, being the nosy country, is trying to make sure it doesn't happen. So they're going to have a conference at the palace to make some terms so that they wouldn't start a war. Though it would be obvious with people crowding the streets to get a glimpse of Cademeca's president and Sakriny's … chairman." She explained.

"When will they be here?"

"Within the next few days." She told him.

**XXX**

**Sorry I haven't updated in a while, I've been busy with school and such. Wow … I've written almost 60 pages of this stuff and most of it is just random tangents. Yay an Author's Note where the author is not babbling!**


	12. Chapter 12: Plan

Chapter 12: Plan

**Last time you'd have to suffer through several pages of pointless dialogue now we're getting to something of a plot.**

**XXX**

A few days later Simon noticed that there was a crowd around Main Street, and some other streets leading up to the palace. He walked over to the crowd and tried to look over them, he plowed himself through the crowd getting: "Hey watch it!" and "Well excuse me!" He apologized as he went through, he flung himself onto the street then backed back into the front of the crowd. He saw an automobile with men standing around it on platforms, the windows were down, Simon couldn't see who was inside the vehicle because the men were blocking it, he could only get a glimpse of red hair. Another vehicle drove by with soldiers marching in front of it and behind it, the cover was open exposing the man with slicked back dirty blonde hair and a handlebar mustache, next to him was a woman with shoulder length green hair, and an eyepatch over her left eye, bother wore black uniforms and a red armband with a black symbol he couldn't see. He heard a mix of concerned babble and cheers, he assumed that the man in the closed vehicle with body guards surrounded was Cademeca's president, while the man in the black uniform was Sakriny's chairman. He followed the vehicles through the crowds, trying to keep their eyes on them. He followed them until he ran into Luke for the first time in a while.

"Luke?"

"Hello, Simon, could you please stand back and may I have your sword?" Luke greeted, Simon nearly forgot the rapier around his waist. He unbuckled it and gave it to Luke. Then he followed Luke.

"What are you doing? Why do you need my sword?"

"I'm doing my job." Luke said bluntly.

"Okay, so what does taking my sword have to do with anything?"

"It's a weapon that could harm President Lanvaldear and Chairman Reltih." He said not turning around and quickly checking people

"Do you think that I'm here to harm them?"

"Man you ask a lot of questions! It's just a job. I'm not particularly happy about protecting Chairman Reltih but it's a job."

"Why not?"

"If you have to serve a man that's starving a country to death you wouldn't be to thrilled about it either. If it were up to me I would let any one with a pistol shoot the man." Growled Luke, controlling his volume.

"I know someone else that feels the same way." Simon muttered to himself. "By the way, who's the woman with Reltih?"

"That's Josephine Nilats," Said Luke, still not turning his head, "She's Reltih's right hand man. Now if you excuse me I have a job to do, I'll return your sword later." He left Simon behind, Simon walked the other direction behind the vehicles. He came to a stop when he saw the president of Cademeca stepped out of his automobile. He was an old man, though still standing straight, with graying red hair and a mustache, unlike Reltih, he wore a suit. The king came out and greeted the two before they disappeared into the palace. A while later, after the people anticipating something extraordinary, the crowd left. Simon almost got himself caught in the crowd when he shoved himself out onto the middle of the street.

"Oh! Simon!" He heard a woman say, he turned around to see Cheria behind him. "I haven't seen you in a while."

"Same, what are you doing here?"

"I'm just seeing a friend close to the military base and you?"

"I was seeing what was going on around here and I need to get my sword back from someone."

"From one of the guild members patrolling the streets?" She asked, Simon nodded. "Well I'd better be on my way." Simon nodded his head and got out of Cheria's way. He rummaged through the crowd for Luke, until he found him talking to someone and giving up a pistol. He tapped him on the shoulder.

"You want your sword back don't you?" He sighed turning around, handing back his rapier.

"Uh … yeah … how did-" Simon began.

"You were gonna come back for it eventually." Luke shrugged, "See ya around." He left Simon standing in the crowd. Simon felt like he for got something.

_'That's right! If I don't ask this now Kanonno and Marianya are gonna kill me!' _He thought. He ran after Luke, calling his name.

"What is it now?" Luke said, rather annoyed.

"I was wondering, What day and time do you guys leave for Cademeca?" He asked.

Luke crossed his arms and quirked an eyebrow, "Why do you need to know?" He asked. Simon was silent for a moment, figuring out what to say.

Finally he spurted out "Me and a few friends are refugees from Sakriny we've been looking for away to Cademeca without much luck and we don't have any visas or passports and since I saw your ship flying by we figured that we could sneak on to get there so I was asked to befriend you to get the information so we can hide on your ship." Luke hardly caught what he said.

"So let me get this straight, you're a refugee fearing to return to Sakriny so you want to go to Cademeca through our airship?" He figured. Simon nodded, "You wanted to get some information from me so you can sneak on right?" Simon nodded again. "Has it occurred to you that one of us would be kind enough to smuggle you on board?"

"Ah … well …" he began, Luke did have a point, "No …" Luke smirked.

"Meet me close to the outskirts of the city with your friends tomorrow morning." He ordered, "Got that?" Simon nodded, "Good, make sure no one follows you."

XXX

"I don't know why you needed us out here, Simon, does it really have to do with us getting to Cademeca?" Kanonno complained.

"Trust me, getting to the outskirts will get us out of here." Simon tried to persuade, knowing very well that Kanonno, Marianya, and Laurel don't know any of the guild members. Kanonno crossed her arms, and glared at him. _'I should've gotten her drunk.'_ He thought. Marianya and Laurel were just as skeptical.

"Simon, you've been acting a little off, are you planning to kill us?" Marianya joked.

"Why would I kill you, what could I possibly gain from it?" Questioned Simon.

"Hm … it would be very out of character." Marianya admitted, "I'm having a hard time imagining you murdering anybody." Simon looked around for Luke close to the outskirts, Luke wasn't too clear on where he in the outskirts he needed to go.

"There you are Simon." He heard a voice say. He turned to see Luke behind him with a crate, with holes on the top, on a small cart. "These are your friends huh? My aren't you popular." He said with a smirk.

"It's not like that! We're …" Marianya exclaimed.

"It's platonic." Kanonno stated.

"I can't get near him without him sneezing and coughing." Laurel sighed.

"I'm just joking." Said Luke,"You guys want to get out of the country right?"

"Where did you get that?" Kanonno asked.

"You're friend here told me that you're trying to get away from Sakriny. With the political situation and the extermination of various people I think I can understand why you need to get away." Said Luke, "As for wanting to go to Cademeca, it's far from Sakriny's boarders, and it wants nothing to do with Sakriny, so it's considerably the safest place for a refugee. Am I right?"

"...Yes…" Said Kanonno.

"Though the problem is, there have been restrictions placed on immigrants, particularly the ones coming from Sakriny." Stated Luke, "So we might as well smuggle you guys in." He said patting on the cart.

"It's a nice idea but doesn't someone check if people are being smuggled in?" Marianya asked.

"I plan to hide you some where on the ship, if I can't you're probably gonna end up sharing the crate with engine parts and tools." Luke shrugged.

"Is there a catch to this?"

"No catch, just get in the crate." Said Luke.

"All four of us? Right now?" Simon asked nervous.

"Yes all four of you, and right now. I'm leaving tomorrow, so I might as well sneak you onto the ship early so no one gets suspicious." Said Luke.

"But what about-" Marianya began,

"It's a work in progress, get in the crate." Ordered Luke.

"This plan is filled with holes." Said Kanonno.

"I know I said that I'm working on it, get in the crate." Luke persisted.

"Do we have to be in the crate?" Simon asked looking over to Laurel.

"Yes, get in the crate." Said Luke sounding irritated.

"But…" Simon began,

"Now …" Hissed Luke.

"All right!" cried Simon opening the crate and crouching in. The other three looked at Luke skeptically. Luke took a deep breath.

"I'll let you out at night if you have any … "business."" Promised Luke. The two women and the flying cat looked at each other, shrugged and followed Simon into the crate. "Try not to make any sounds while I'm getting you onto the airship, got that?" He said closing the crate.

"Shit." Murmured Simon.

"What was that Simon?" Luke asked.

"Nothing at all." He lied feeling a tickle in his throat and nose. Luke pushed the cart to outside of the city. It wasn't long until Simon started sneezing and coughing.

"Will you keep it down?" Luke growled pounding the crate.

"Sor-atchoo!" Sneezed Simon, which was followed by coughing, "Al … al … altchoo! Allergies."

"To what?"

Simon coughed until he spat out "Cats!"

"Oh lord …" Moaned Luke, he took off his gloves, tied them together to form some sort of mask. He opened the crate and gave the glove mask to Simon, "Hopefully this will lessen your symptoms." Simon put it over his nose and mouth like how one would use a handkerchief.

"Thanks." Said Simon with a raspy voice. The sneezing and coughing somewhat faded after a while but now Simon was worrying his watering eyes. Luke had to cover his coughs as they went past the military on the landing platform. He also made excuses about the crate. The four felt like they were going up a ramp then it leveled out. Then Luke pushed them off the cart.

He opened the crate and offered them to get out and stretch, Simon popped out and hung over the edge of the crate like a dead cat.

"No one should be on the ship right now, so you can get out of the crate. I'll be returning cart. Don't leave the ship's hold, or the ship." He ordered.

"Feels like we're being held prisoner." Muttered Kanonno crossing her arms.

"Well we can't do much about it." Shrugged Marianya. Simon looked up from his position and noticed a smile on Luke's face, either that or it was his tears blurring his vision. When Simon's vision cleared he went back into the box.

"Are you all right?" Marianya asked.

"I will be until someone closes the crate again." Said Simon.

"I can move out and hide somewhere else on the ship." Laurel suggested.

"No, don't it's fine, I'll just use this, though I'm not sure how long this will last." Sighed Simon, waving up Luke's glove mask. _'Though why put the crate here a day before? Am I going to die from my allergies by the time we get there?'_ Simon sighed not looking forward to the days to come.

**XXX**

**Well that was short … relatively speaking. Trying something new. Next time on Tales of the World: New Age Mythology:**

"**What do we have here? Stowaways?"**

"**We can let you stay if you're willing to work for it?"**

**Please review I would like to have feedback, hell this fic takes anonymous reviews! Now I'm sounding like a little weaboo who craves attention. Though in all honesty I could use the feed back.**


	13. Chapter 13: Caught with Pirates

Chapter 13: Caught with a ship full of pirates

**Last time Simon and company were stowed away onto the Cademecan air ship.**

It had been a two days since Luke stowed Simon and friends onboard the airship. They had some close calls of getting caught due to Simon's sneezing and coughing, whenever Luke would let them out for the bathroom, and Kanonno's muttering in her sleep. Simon was glad he didn't wake up screaming from any of his nightmares. Though that night in particular, Luke was waiting for Simon to be done when he spotted Chloe. He intercepted her and asked her what she was doing so late at night, she told him that she had to use the head and asked if someone's already there. He quickly lied and said that Asch is there. Once Simon was done he got out of the head and noticed that Chloe was talking to Luke, he panicked for a brief moment then he ran for the closest hiding place.

"What was that?" Chloe asked, turning her head.

"That's nothing." Lied Luke getting in the way of Chloe's vision.

"Are you all right Luke?" She asked, "You seem a little jumpy."

"It's the … um … altitude! Yeah!" Luke took in a deep breath, "Ah! Yep that altitude!"

"Okay …" Said Chloe, a bit scared of Luke's attitude, "be careful with the … altitude … don't pass out, now if you excuse me." She shoved Luke aside and ran towards the head. Luke ran over to Simon's hiding spot.

"The coast is clear." Luke whispered. Simon crawled out of his hiding spot. The two started heading back to the crate when Asch found them. Simon shivered, fearing that he might get deported to Sakriny. Asch glared at Luke then he ran off.

"Asch!" Luke shouted chasing after him, they headed to the ship's hold. Luke froze when he saw Asch at the crate where Simon and friends hid. "Asch please …" Asch opened the crate. He had an "I knew it!" look on his face.

"Now what do we have here?" He said to himself, "Stowaways?" His smirk quickly turned into a frown as he walked over to Luke. Simon got between the two brothers.

"Listen, I got Luke involved in this, I told him about our situation and he agreed to help. If you should scold anyone it should be me." Said Simon.

"What?" Questioned Asch raising both eyebrows, Luke looked just as shocked.

"Scold me instead of Luke, I got him into this mess." Simon repeated.

"Simon …" Luke began.

"Let me explain." Said Kanonno standing up from the crate.

Asch sighed, "Fine tell your story." Kanonno started from when she found Simon unconscious on the roof of her work place. She explained Simon's amnesia and the worry of being unable to find a family tree, thus smuggling him out of Sakriny. She told them about someone reporting them to Reltih's soldiers, which is why she, Laurel, and Marianya escaped the country days after Simon made it to St. Gabriel.

"You see after Simon head a rumor of guild members from Cademeca, we were a bit skeptical at first but when Simon claimed he saw your airship I thought we could have Simon be friendly with you to get some information so we can sneak onto the ship." She explained.

"Really?" Said Asch, "You didn't get confirmation for what your friend said? And you do realize that you could've snuck on once you saw the ship or ask one of your guild friends to sneak you on board?"

"Well …" Said Kanonno getting nervous.

"Asch she-" Luke began.

"Stay out of this Luke." Asch snapped back, "Well?"

"The only one really associated with the guild is Simon and I didn't want to wait a week in the ship." Said Kanonno crossing her arms

"Well why the hell not?" growled Asch, "You could've stolen our canned goods."

"That's the thing, I hate canned goods." Kanonno stated. Asch face-palmed, his eyes rolled off as he slimed his hand off his face.

"Oh for the love of …" He muttered to himself. "You, not willing to wait got my brother dragged into this mess…"

"Well actually I …" Simon began.

"You! Shut up!" Asch shouted.

"Asch what are you yelling about?" They turned to see Chloe with a lantern. She was caught by surprise upon seeing Simon, which quickly turned calm.

"I'm inquiring some stowaways, all I'm able to find out is that man's name is not "Simon" and this woman is insane." He said.

"What about the other two?" She asked nudging her chin to Marianya and Laurel.

"We're just innocent bystanders that got caught up in this mess." Said Marianya.

"Are these stowaways refugees by any chance?" Chloe asked.

"Yes." Asch replied. Chloe left them she came back minutes later with a drowsy Natalia. The two exchanged some quiet words then Natalia left.

"We'll let them stay."

"What?" Luke and Asch said in unison.

"You heard me." She said, then turning to Simon, "We'll let you stay under one condition. You work on the ship, understood?"

"Yes, Mam." Stated Kanonno.

"Good, I'll see you in the morning." Said Chloe, leaving.

XXX

The next morning Natalia and Chloe gave them jobs to do and informed the captain of the stowaways. Marianya and Laurel were in the kitchen, Kanonno had to work in the engine room and Simon was the temporary cabin boy. He was given a mop and bucket. It was also advised that they would wear goggles outside if they didn't want the wind bothering their eyes, especially on rough drafts.

"So about last night, when Kanonno was explaining your story," Luke began while Simon swabbed the deck.

"What about it?" Simon asked.

"You remember absolutely nothing correct?"

"Yep not even my own name." Simon shrugged, "Why'd you ask?"

"You seem awfully calm about it."

"Is that a bad thing?"

"Not necessarily I mean I personally would be more frustrated about it I might even suspect that I could be an artificial human." Luke shrugged.

"Is that even possible?"

"Well it's not possible now but technology during the Apocalypse period-" Luke said.

"Wait." Simon interrupted, "How do you know about the Apocalypse period? I heard it's not common knowledge." Luke cringed

"Well … the name's … common knowledge … is it really that uncommon?" Luke stammered.

"I'm sorry, I'm not very book smart, I just heard a little from some summoners." Said Simon.

"I … I was taught about the Apocalypse period by a summoner as well." Said Luke.

"I'm sorry, as you were saying about the Apocalypse period?" Simon asked.

_'Thank god he didn't get suspicious, it could put our family in danger if he was …'_ Luke relaxed then cleared his throat, "In my lessons, I heard that they were able to create mechanical people that looked very human and they were able to clone humans. Thought the clones don't have a memories about the originals. Some of the technology was found for the mechanical people and the governments are doing research on them."

"Amazing!" Said Simon, "Could I be one of those … fancy artificials?"

"Highly unlikely." Said Luke bluntly. That's when Asch came in.

"You should be working." He said to Simon, then he grabbed Luke's arm and dragged him away into a cabin. Simon continued with his work.

"Are you insane?" Asch whispered peering out the window of the cabin.

"I know I almost gave him away, I'm sorry." Luke whispered back. Asch grabbed the collar of his shirt.

"We were lucky he didn't get suspicious about your knowledge of Apocalypse period technology or you didn't give away anything about the spirits." Asch hissed.

"Other wise you would've killed me, I know." Luke muttered.

"Sometimes I wonder if you really do know, idiot." Asch said to himself, "Never mind."

"We probably shouldn't worry about Simon, the boy confirmed himself that he's not very smart." Said Luke looking out the window, "I mean he fell for the summoner excuse very easily, I'm worried about his friends figuring out though, I mean it took a long time to convince them to hide in the crate."

"Then don't slip up about him around them, got that?"

"Yeah yeah, you be careful too." Said Luke, just then they heard explosions outside, and the ship tilted over causing them to fall. Then Simon burst through the door panting.

"We're under attack!" He said.

"Really, we haven't noticed." Said Asch in a sarcastic tone, "And why didn't you tell the captain?"

"Well she was-" Before Simon could finish his sentence a bell sound went off outside, Luke shoved Simon out of the way as he and Asch ran to below deck. Simon heard more explosions that rocked the ship, knocking him over.

"Simon!" He heard Kanonno shout, she ran over to him to help him up. "What are you doing here don't we have a ship to guard?"

"I guess but shouldn't the crew be handling it?"

"This is a guild ship it uses guild members to run it because guild ship captains can't look for civilians to get a crew for some reason." She explained dragging him outside where a ship is with a black flag sailed closer, Simon heard explosions from the ship he was on blowing two holes onto the side of the airship. Nonetheless the ship grew closer.

"Help Luke and Asch with the canons." Kanonno ordered, Simon nodded and ran below deck when the ship got close enough that grappling hooks were being latched onto the side of the ship. Simon turned around and drew his sword just as men with loose clothing, red vests and bandannas on their heads climbed on board. Kanonno loaded her rifle and shot at whoever came up while Simon would cut up the ropes before any more men would climb on board. Then a large dog jumped over them and landed behind them. On the dogs back was a man with messy red hair and eye patch and dressed like most of the men except he didn't wear a red vest and the bottom of his pants were torn up over his boots. Accompanying him was a girl with short brown hair with a grey cap on top of it she wore a yellow vest and a brown skirt, her boots were mismatched as one boot had straps while the other was laced. She also had a bag slung over her right shoulder.

"Thatta boy Geit." Said the man patting the large dog.

"Thanks for the ride Spot." Said the girl getting off the dog then running off. Simon tried to go after her, but he heard a click then he felt an agonizing pain through his leg, he collapsed to one knee, dropping his sword. He looked down and noticed that there was an arrow through his thigh. He looked over to see the man had gotten off his dog with a cross bow. He had a cocky grin on his face as he loaded another arrow. They heard a bang and a small cone like object would've hit the man's foot if he didn't step back. The dog yelped. Simon turned his head to see Kanonno with the gun pointed at the man she peered through the scope with a narrowed eye and gritted her teeth as she place her index finger on the trigger.

"You got some guts li-" Before he could finish Kanonno fired another shot and the man dodged the bullet. "Hey I wasn't done talking!"

"Oh I'm sorry, continue while I shoot your brains out." Said Kanonno loading another bullet. Simon turned his attention back to his leg and ripped the arrow out he took up his sword he charged for the red head when he heard a gun shot behind him, he spun around to see a young girl with blonde braids wearing a black vest over her shirt and a red skirt over black leggings. She had a hat on but it was a tricorne hat. She had a pistol out, pointed at Simon. Her grin seemed to advise Simon not to attack the red head. He turned back to see Kanonno shooting at the man making him dance away from the bullets, not giving him any time to load his crossbow. He stood frozen, unsure what to do. If he tried to help Kanonno he'd get shot, if he attacked the girl he would also get shot but he was more bothered by the fact that he'd be attacking a little girl.

"What are you doing Simon? There are other men climbing a board!" Shouted Kanonno loading her rifle. "Forget about the girl and worry about them!"

"Though you'd probably have to go through me to get to them." Grinned the little girl.

"Photon!" A woman shouted a ball of light blasted the girl to the side, Simon turned to see Marianya skimming pages of a book and muttering some incantation, "Heal!" She said and a light surrounded him and the wound in his leg disappeared without a scar. She gave him a reassuring grin, Simon nodded and charged for the men in red vests. He slashed them across the waist and stabbed a few in between parries. He quickly became overwhelmed with the men coming on board and the rest of the crew was busy with other members from the ship. Suddenly he felt something hit him and wrap around him, he dropped his sword and fell over from the force of the thing that bound him. He looked down to find rope around his limbs, he tried to squirm out.

"There's no use trying to escape lad." He heard a man say, Simon turned his head but he couldn't turn it far enough to get a good look at the man's face, all he saw were shoes a pair of black boots. He looked over to see Kanonno in the same position, except she wasn't moving.

"Put them in the brig." Ordered the man.

XXX

The very few people that were running the ship were tied up below deck, in the brig, including Simon and the ship's captain, a young girl with dark skin and blonde hair named Chat. Luke was passed out, bleeding from his head while Asch breathed heavily. Chloe also breathed heavily but she tried to hide the pain in her shoulder she received from a bullet. Kanonno was also out though she wasn't bleeding. Simon could feel his allergies acting up being next to Laurel. They were being watched by the red head man who shot Simon through the leg, who the leader called 'Moses.'

"Great, just great, we pick up some extra baggage and then get attacked by pirates." Chat groaned to herself.

"Are you all right … Natalia?" Asch asked.

"I'm fine Asch, but are you okay?" Natalia responded looking at Asch's side which was bleeding. "Should I heal you?"

"There's … no need." Said Asch turning away from Natalia.

"I'm sorry I wasn't much help." Said Simon, sniffing.

"We all got overwhelmed. Some of these sky pirate crews can have several men so there is a chance that we would get outnumbered." Said Marianya.

"What exactly are these sky pirates?" Simon asked. Everyone, except the unconscious ones looked at him shocked, in some cases ignoring their wounds.

"How hard did you hit your head?" Marianya whispered to Simon.

"Did I hear you correctly boy?" Moses asked, "You do not know what sky pirates are?" His voice sounded close to laughing. Simon decided to keep his mouth shut.

_'You were right Luke.'_ Asch thought wanting to grab his side to stop the blood.

"You don't know who or what we are?" Moses taunted.

"No … I do not." Stated Simon.

"My my …" Moses chuckled, "what type of rock do you live under? We're the white rabbit!"

"White rabbit? Thank god." Chat sighed.

"Why is this a good thing?" Natalia asked.

"We have a higher chance of surviving with the White Rabbit, compared to getting captured by the Siren's Fang, or the Babbage Device." Said Chat. "I hear the captain refuses to kill his hostages for some reason."

"And you heard right miss." Said Moses, "Though the captain think he has good reasons for letting his prisoners live though it creates an inconvenience."

"That's enough Moses." Said the captain, a man with strawberry blond hair tied back with a goatee wearing the same type of hat the blond girl wore. He also had a reddish long coat that seemed to match the rest of his outfit. His eyes were a bit blood shot from a lack of sleep. He had a rapier strapped to his hip, much like Simon. "Forgive my crew they have a tendency to be a bit … unruly."

"Which is quite ironic, I would think Captain Adrian Reynolds would take over ships through persuasion." Chat mocked.

"Quite a shame, isn't it?" Captain Reynolds snarked back, "but they're pirates what are you going to do, especially when the first mate is probably plotting something behind your back?" He looked over Chloe, Luke, Asch, and Kanonno. "Moses."

"Yes Captain?" Moses responded.

"Get Norma and tell her to treat the injured prisoners." He ordered. Moses ran back up stairs. The Captain went over and started untying his prisoners one by one, starting with the injured.

"Captain Reynolds is it?" Natalia asked. "Why are you so kind to your prisoners?" The Captain looked at her then turned his attention to untying Luke.

"Between you and me, let's just say there are people I want to teach to be functional members of society." He said, "Having a crew that will murder people simply won't do."

"Then why the hell do you call yourself a pirate?" Asch said through his teeth.

"Don't get me wrong I still steal from trading companies I just use different tactics." Said the Captain untying him. "Oh, and bless your parents for having to put up with you and your brother." The Captain said to himself.

"What?" Said Asch as the Captain pat his shoulder and laughed. The girl in the yellow vest came down and casted a healing spell on each injured hostages, he then dismissed her.

"I took a look through your ship, you don't seem to have anything of much value, but it seems that I may be wrong." He said eyeing Natalia, "It won't do me much good to hold President Ingobert's daughter hostage I'd rather not be hunted by Cademeca, I already have enough trouble with Speg and Sakriny."

_'Sakriny? What did he do to Sakriny? Unless … no it couldn't be, it was a dark that later got sent to a labor camp. Then again, this wouldn't be the first time the government has lied to us …'_ Marianya thought.

"Is something wrong?" Simon asked.

"I was wondering if he was behind the Saligrad incident …" Marianya whispered.

"I can say that I worked for the man behind the incident when I started out about five years ago. I've robbed military ships more recently." The Captain said to Marianya, "It's surprising what Sakriny's military keeps on their airships, anything found on those things is enough to feed and clothe a family of four for a year."

"Is that it?" Simon heard a murmur, he looked over to see Kanonno waking up. "Those pigs in the military keep things that could feed a family for a year? And what do we get?"

"Kanonno …" Simon began.

"We get closely monitored rations handed out to us weekly, some of them with questionable quality and whatever isn't used can't be saved for the next week but returned. I wouldn't complain about it if rations aren't half eaten or rotten." She vented, "And those rations clearly aren't enough to feed a family of four, they're only meant for one person!" she took a deep breath and calmed herself.

"Is that all Kanonno?" Laurel asked.

"No, there's plenty to rant about Sakriny's broken system but it would take far too long. There's not enough time cover it all." She said stretching her arms.

"I couldn't agree more madam." Said the Captain, turning to Chat, "Shall we discuss any terms miss …?"

"Chat," She introduced, "What is there to discuss we don't have anything of value on this ship." Simon sneezed distracting the two captains.

"Sorry…" He said, his face red and buried in his knees. The Captain walked over to Simon.

"As you were lad." He said. Simon looked at him confused. The Captain examined his face while rubbing his chin. "Have we met?" He asked.

"I … I don't know." Said Simon. "I don't think so."

"My mistake, you look someone I knew." He said turning his attention back to Chat. Just then a man with dark hair wearing fashion similar to the captain, minus the hat ran in. "What is it?"

"The crew is going nuts." He said, "Eliza is throwing a fit, Adam and Allen are fighting over something." The Captain ran out of the brig with the other man. Not too long after Luke woke up.

"What happened?" He moaned.

"Not much." Said Asch, "Except meeting the captain of the White Rabbit."

"Oh." Sighed Luke "Lucky."

"Are you all right Luke? That gash in the back of your head look pretty bad." Natalia stated.

"Really …" Said Luke rubbing the back of his head then examining his hand for any blood. "I'm fine."

"That's because one of Reynolds' men healed us." Said Asch, meanwhile Simon's vision was getting blurry, he rubbed his eyes.

"Are you okay?" Marianya asked.

"I'm fine it's just allergies." He answered, followed with a moan for his headache.

"Are you sure?" Marianya asked, wrapping her arms around Simon's shoulders. Faded images of Captain Reynolds flashed in his mind, he said something but he could hear gibberish come out of his mouth.

The images stopped then an unfamiliar voice said: "Winters … your name … Winters." He couldn't make out the sounds that came before the word "Winters." His headache stopped and his vision became clear again.

"Simon?" Marianya said.

"I'm fine …" He said, "I think I remember something."

"Really?" Said Kanonno turning to him.

"Yeah … I remember my last name, it's Winters, and something about Captain Reynolds … I think I knew Captain Reynolds some time ago and he asked me something … it might be a favor, I'm not sure."

"Simon Winters …" Said Kanonno, "That's a nice name, even if your first name is fake and it gives you a clue to who you are."

"Wait …" Said Chloe, "Didn't you just say that you don't know him, and didn't Reynolds say that you look like someone he knew, just because you look like that someone doesn't exactly mean you are that someone."

_'She's right … that man could just be a man that looks like Captain Reynolds, and if I met him some years back, I would've been younger than eighteen I met him.' _Simon thought, just as he was thinking about the images of Captain Reynolds. The Captain came back down with a child holding his hand. Everyone gawked at them.

"Pardon me, this is Allen, he's in time out could you keep an eye on him?" He asked.

"Daddy!" The boy whined.

"Daddy has some work to do, he has to talk to this young lady. I'll be back in a minute, mean while you think about what you did." He said to the boy, then he turned to Chat, "Should we talk above deck?" Chat nodded the two left the brig leaving the boy with seven young adults and a flying cat.

XXX

**Sorry I haven't been able to update for a while, I've been too busy with AP exams, and making sure I graduate. Summer's coming soon so expect updates coming more often than once a month. Meet Adrian Reynolds, and yes, he is a father. I was planning to have him appear just this once but then I developed this back story and he wound up being a major character so you'll be seeing more of him and you'll be seeing a little bit more pirates, hell I might end up as a pirate cameo. **


	14. Chapter 14: Deal!

Chapter 14: Deal!

**Last time on Tales of the World: New Age Mythology, Asch caught Simon and friends on board while Luke tried to cover for them. Natalia said that they can stay on the ship if they can work. Then they got attacked by a pirate crew called the "White Rabbit," the captain, Adrian Reynolds, sent them to the brig. He asked Simon and gang to watch his son while he works things out with Chat.**

XXX

"I want Daddy." The child demanded.

"Your daddy's busy, he can't come." Said Asch.

"I want Daddy." The child repeated. Asch sighed with anguish.

"You can see Daddy, if you tell us why you're down here." Marianya bribed.

"I don't know." Said the child.

"Then can you tell us what happened before your daddy brought you here? You won't see daddy unless you tell us." She reminded.

"Uh … Adam srew Mr. Bubbwes off da ship." The boy said, "I hit him, he hit back, he bit me, I pull his hair, he said he will tell daddy, and I pushed him to the ground. Then we hit Eliza, she stared crying then daddy came up."

"Can you tell us who Adam, Mr. Bubbles and Eliza are?" Marianya asked again.

"Why I told what happened!" Pouted the boy.

"You can't see daddy until you tell me everything." Said Marianya.

_'This is just cruel Mari.' _Kanonno thought, while Simon looked on cluelessly, growing more uncomfortable each time his eyes wandered to the boy.

"Adam is my bwotha, Eliza is my sista, Mr. Bubbwes is from Mommy." Said the boy.

"So wouldn't your mommy be mad if you lost Mr. Bubbles?"

"I dunno, Mommy left when I was a baby."

"I see." Said Marianya rubbing her chin, "So you and your brother had a fight because your brother threw a gift from your mommy off the ship?"

"… Yes?" said the child.

"Is that a bad thing?"

"No." Said the child.

"And why do you think that?" Asked Marianya.

"He srew off da ship!" He repeated.

"And you hurt him for that? Isn't hurting people wrong?" Asked Marianya.

"Yes…" Said the child sounding defeated.

"Do you understand why you were punished?"

"No."

Marianya sighed, "Now if you really want to see your daddy you think about what you did, quietly." The child pouted his lips. The brig was quiet for a while.

"Children!" blurted Luke breaking the silence.

"What?" Said Simon.

"Captain Reynolds has children!" He replied.

"Really, you don't say." Said Asch sarcastically.

"Oh shut up!" Growled Luke, "This explains a lot!"

"That's true, he's a single parent that's probably having a hard time caring for his kids. They do have it rough, trying to make a living and all." Said Kanonno. "He must be desperate."

"It also explains his no killing policy." Asch commented. "Though I'm not quite sure if he's setting a great example."

"He's trying, at least he has others taking care of them while he's at … work." Said Kanonno, "Hopefully they're in good hands."

"Are you talking about daddy?" The boy asked.

"Yes, but more about his cr-" Kanonno began.

"Daddy is da best daddy ever!" The boy claimed. "He lets us drive da ship at times but he doesn't like it when we play games in some parts of ship. But daddy is always good to me, Adam, and Eliza, he's good to his cwu …" The boy trailed on about the Captain. When Captain Reynolds and Chat walked as the boy said that Captain Reynolds was the best dad ever for the umpteenth time.

"Okay, that's enough Allen, run along now." Said the Captain allowing his boy to run on deck, then turning to the others "Thanks for putting up with him, I hope he wasn't too much trouble."

"Not at all sir." Stated Marianya.

"Anyway, your captain and I came up with a little deal. I'll drop you off in Franklin, while I'm resupplying, as long you pay a fee." He said.

"How much?" Luke asked. Before Captain Reynolds could respond Simon took out the ten thousand gald he got from St. Gabriel.

"Simon!" Kanonno gasped, The Captain laughed.

"You don't care much for your money do you lad?" He mused.

"I was going to save it but right now this is more important." Simon stated.

"Simon we need that!" Kanonno shouted.

"He doesn't know how to manage his expenses does he?" Asch whispered to Luke.

"I don't know him that well." Luke whispered back, "Though he does seem like the type to throw his money out the window when given the chance."

"I'll only take half, my crew and family can manage." Said the Captain.

"I … I insist. We can always find jobs." Said Simon.

"You're going to need this more than I do lad, half." Said the Captain.

"Take it! Take it you idiot!" Kanonno whispered.

"Okay …" Said Simon, taking back five thousand gald. Kanonno sighed with relief.

"There's another part of the deal." Said the Captain, "You have to keep quiet about my children."

"Why?" Natalia asked.

"To keep them away from a certain someone who's been … hunting them down since the boys were born." He said, "She's been wanting my head on a steak for about eight years."

"Is this person who's 'Hunting your children down' their mother?" Natalia asked.

The captain gave a dull laugh, "If that were the case, I probably wouldn't be a pirate in the first place."

"Oh!" Natalia's eyes widened. "I'm sorry."

"No need to feel sorry, just keep up this end of the deal, or I'll have to kill you." Said the Captain.

"You have our word, Captain Reynolds." Said Chat.

"Good, oh and you all have the freedom to roam the ship until we get there. Just don't get into the bridge or the captain's quarters, I'm sure you're able to understand that." Said the Captain.

"Even though it was our ship." Chat muttered under her breath.

XXX

Simon flinched while stretching out his limbs, after being in the brig for a while he became sensitive to sunlight. His group had scattered and were hidden amongst the red vests. He ran into the young blonde girl that would've shot him earlier.

"Oh, Hello~!" She greeted.

"Er … Greetings." He replied, she giggled.

"My my, you're certainly formal."

"F-formal?" He questioned.

"Yep, it's kinda cute, no wonder you're surrounded by women." She teased.

"Huh?"

"You've developed quite a harem." She joked.

"Harem? What's that?"

"Oh right, you're the same guy Moses mention that does not know what a sky pirate is." She muttered to herself. "It's something that you shouldn't be having if you believe in staying true to your wedding vows."

"So it's like adultery." Concluded Simon.

"Something like that, then again it depends on your customs and if your wife will join in. Though where you're going, having a harem is unacceptable." She said.

"Oh." Said Simon immediately understanding.

"Now about sky pirates …" She began.

"I've figured it out, thank you um …" Said Simon.

"Patty, Patty Fleur, think nothing of it mister …" She trailed off.

"Winters. Simon Winters." He introduced.

"Winters, right, don't get too comfortable here. You'll never know if someone will just slip up and accidently stab someone." She warned walking off leaving Simon slightly paranoid. He walked off into a different direction and met up with Chloe. She constantly looked over her shoulder and stood on her toes to see over men taller than her. Panic was written on her face.

"Is something wrong Chloe?" He asked.

"Have you seen Natalia anywhere?" She asked.

"Nope, but I'm sure she'll be where ever Asch might be." He shrugged, "Why?"

"I'm supposed to protect the president and his family, if I can't protect his daughter, them I'm a failure." She said. Simon was unsure about responding, he worried about sounding insensitive.

"Can I help in any way?" He offered.

"For now, no, but if you find Natalia drag her back here." She ordered. Simon nodded and went to one of the sides of the ship. He looked over the ledge and down at the ocean below he gasped in amazement. He watched birds flying below the ship, he chuckled to himself.

"You're acting like you've never been on a ship before." He heard a voice say, he turned to see Kanonno standing next to him.

"This is … well … I don't know how to explain it, but this feels great." He said, "It's exciting yet terrifying at the same time, this feels completely new. I feel … free."

"I know what you mean." She said, leaning on a ledge, "Wind in your hair, the low oxygen, the great view, and the fact we're thousands of feet off the ground, why wouldn't it feel great?"

"Have you been on an airship before?" He asked, changing the subject.

"No, this is my first time actually, and the first time I've tinkered with an airship's engine before." She giggled to herself. Simon looked into the distance.

"How long do you think it'll take to get to Cademeca?" He asked.

"A few days," She said, "Hopefully our friend is still in the capital. Cademeca is a big place, it might be hard to track him."

XXX

**By god when are you gonna have a plot? Soon enough, we might get somewhere within the next few chapters. Yeah, another short chapter that's mainly a filler.**


	15. Chapter 15: Peter

Chapter 15: Peter

**Last time, pointless dialogue.**

**XXX**

The capital of Cademeca, Franklin, was warming up. It was chilly but sunny, and the trees in the area bloomed. Four days since the ship was captured, Captain Reynolds kept his promise and dropped them off in Franklin unharmed. Chat mumbled to herself about an excuse on loosing a ship as she said farewell to the group. Natalia and Chloe got onto a cable car for the capital building, so Luke, and Asch stayed with Simon's company for a little bit before jumping onto a trolley bus heading to the guild district.

"Where should we look?" Kanonno muttered to herself as Simon observed the busy streets of Franlkin, nothing compared to St. Gabriel. For one, it was elevated, and the people were getting onto all sorts of vehicles, carriages, trolleys, cable cars, trains, and even flying machines. There vendors on the side of the street overshadowed by the bigger shops, and he could see above him, factories billowing smoke into the sky, but not so much smoke that it would block out the sun.

"Stay close Simon." Laurel reminded.

"Ah … right!" He said snapping back to reality and jogging to the group.

"We should probably check a bar." Kanonno concluded.

"Why? Because you haven't had a drink in days?" Marianya scolded.

"Because he's probably slept with the bartender, if not, he's probably hit on one." Kanonno shrugged, "And I could use a drink."

"Why don't we ask where the nearest bar is?" Simon asked.

"We could, but we're probably gonna have to look in several bars to try to get a lead." Marianya mumbled.

"You know, we could just get a few pictures of what he looks like and ask around." Laurel suggested.

"If you haven't noticed Laurel, we don't have a pen and paper." Said Marianya. She looked over to her shoulder, "Then again …" she turned to Simon, "can I borrow the gald." Simon shrugged and gave it to her, "I'll be right back." She said leaving. A few minutes later, she came back with a quill, ink well, and a packet of paper. She knelt down on the ground and started sketching out a picture of a man with spiky hair and a cocky grin on his face.

"Wow, that's pretty accurate." Kanonno complimented as she cranked out three more copies.

"Now we can ask around and see if he's still in town." Marianya said closing the inkwell and blowing on the picture, trying to make it dry faster. "We meet here, back at Inky's in an hour." She pointed back at the pen shop they were very close to. The other three nodded and separated into different directions, Simon looked at a clock tower to see when he had to be at Inky's. He asked around but he got no leads, the closest he got was one guy who said he saw him in a bar once. He looked at the clock tower to see forty minutes have passed.

"Excuse me." He heard someone say, he turned around to see a blond boy a few years younger than him, "My friends and I are wondering if you know anyone who has information about the Apocalypse period."

"Huh?" Simon responded, _'Apocalypse period?'_ Another boy wearing a gas mask came up and grabbed his shoulder.

"You idiot! He's not gonna know about this stuff!" He whispered.

"Oh right …" The blonde whispered back. "Forget what I said dude, I mean … do you know where we could find some books on a certain period?"

"Did you check the library?" Simon asked.

"Of course!" Said the one with the gas mask as if he just realized something. "Why didn't we look there?"

"Oh yeah, the documents should be dry since it's before the incident." Said the blonde boy, the one with the gas mask gave him a sharp glare. "Oh right." Muttered the blonde, shutting up.

"Ignore what he said, he's a bit … crazy." Said the gas mask boy.

"Hey!" The blond protested.

"Anyway, thank you." Said the gas mask boy.

"You're welcome. Before you go," Simon took out his picture of the man he was looking for, "Have you seen him around?" The two boys stared at it intensely for a while. The blond shook his head.

"I think I've seen him heading towards Inky's." Said the gas mask boy, "You might catch him if you hurry."

"Thank you." Said Simon running back to Inky's, once he got there, he didn't see anyone who looked like the picture, so he sat on the curb outside the shop. He sighed _'Did I miss him?'_

"What are you doing here Simon?" He heard Kanonno's voice ask.

"Well I was told that the person you're looking for was around here, but I couldn't find him." He skulked.

"I wasn't really intending on coming here until Kanonno dragged me." Laughed an unfamiliar voice. He looked up to see the man, he looked exactly like the picture, though the picture didn't include the red hair, the goggles on his forehead, his suspenders and his face with coal smudges on it. Simon stood up, noticing that he was several inches taller than him. "The person you asked must be able to predict the future or something." The man joked.

"Ah … um …" Simon began.

"I'm Peter." The man introduced offering a handshake.

"Simon." He replied taking the handshake.

"So you're the boy that made the girls 'out laws' huh?" Peter mused. "You don't seem like the type that the law would be after."

"Well I have amnesia and I don't remember any family, so it might be close to impossible to find a record of my family tree." Simon shrugged, "Plus my surname, Winters, does not sound like a surname from Sakriny, as far as I know."

"Well, just to give you a hint, the family tree thing is complete bull shit." Stated Peter.

"What?" Kanonno and Simon shouted.

"Yeah, it's just for government officials and Reltih's dearest supporters. It does not work for moderate supporters and people who are against him." Said Peter, "It also only works for just the dark hair and eyes trait. If it worked for every trait that Reltih would consider 'impure' then I wouldn't have left because my parents were heterosexual."

"Huh?" Simon wondered, Kanonno rolled her eyes at Simon.

"I'm a homosexual." Peter said quietly, Simon still looked confused. "I'm attracted to other men. The family clause wouldn't work on me because of my sexuality."

"Oh ... because … yeah …" Said Simon between mumbles, "Why here?"

"Because I wouldn't get criminalized." Said Peter, "Though it's still treated like a taboo."

"Ah…" Said Simon, as Marianya and Laurel walked in, Marianya gasped and laughed, Peter turned and spread out his arms with a confident grin on his face. Marianya ran forward and gave him a tackle hug, Peter leaned back from the impact and embraced her. They let go of each other and Peter patted her on the head.

"Well look at you," He smiled, "You've developed into a fine young lady."

"Thanks." she smiled back, "And you're a mess, would it kill you to clean your face and hands."

"I do, they just don't stay clean." Peter laughed, Marianya's mouth gaped open, "Not like that! Get your mind out of the gutter!"

"This reunion is touching and all but we need you to help us out with living arrangements and finding jobs." Laurel interrupted.

"Ah yes, Kanonno told me, five thousand gald is only enough for a few days rent." Said Peter rubbing his chin. "Let's go to my place, we'll figure things out there." The group left the curb in front of Inky's, Peter led them to a trolley that was about to leave. He told the group to stay close as the trolley started up and traveled through the streets of Franklin. The trolley stopped at an area filled with apartment buildings and houses deeper in the area, the group got off the trolley as the next round of passengers got on. The group walked to a tall building, Peter allowed them to enter first. He walked to the front desk to talk to the man there, then another man came up and the three got into a lengthy conversation. Just when Kanonno was about to fall asleep, Peter came back.

"Good news, You all can stay in my apartment, just as long you pay the rent and not make too much noise." He said, gesturing to the others to follow him. "Also you have to make your own meals because I most likely won't be here to provide any."

"Crap." Laurel muttered as they passed a couple of doors with buttons next to them.

"Oh and don't use the elevators, they don't work." Peter informed as they headed to the stairwell. Kanonno nodded, while Simon nervously looked back at the elevators. They climbed up a few flights of stairs and went down a hallway until they reached a door, Peter unlocked it and the group went inside. The apartment had a stove under cabinets, next to a sink with dirty dishes, it also had a bedroom with a messy bed and a bathroom that was just a tub and what looked like a flush toilet. There was a space between rooms that was cluttered with junk and the radio in the corner.

"Welcome to my home, sorry about the space, I normally don't have guests over." He said.

"I can see why." Said Marianya looking around the apartment.

"You have indoor plumbing?" Kanonno gasped.

"Yeah most Cademecan cities have that, though the pipes do get clogged." Said Peter, "And by the look on your face this is heaven when compared to Sakriny."

"Hell yeah! You remember what we have to do with our sewage in Sakriny." Kanonno responded. Peter laughed as he cleared a space on the floor wide enough for the group to sit on. He sat on the floor, the others soon followed.

"Now that you have a place, let's discuss jobs." He said clapping his hands, "Now you'll probably be okay as far as government paper work goes as long as you avoid the jobs that require you to show a visa or something and government officials. Just in case I might know someone that can forge a visa. Also, ladies, you might have a hard time finding some work simply because of your sex. You may have a skill set for a certain job but keep in mind that some of these guys have misogynistic ideals. Now Simon, your amnesia may be problematic because you don't remember any skills, correct?"

"Yes." Simon nodded.

"All I have to say that you need to either try to jog your memory, educate yourself, or go to a guild." Shrugged Peter.

"The guild? I've kinda been rejected from the guild in Speg." Said Simon nervously.

"I'm assuming you're talking about Ad libitum correct?" Peter asked.

"Yeah."

"There are other guilds besides Ad libitum you know, though that's probably the guild that might help you find out who you are. Brave Vesperia might take you in, if you're up for traveling around often. Though guilds like Fortune's Market, or the Soul Smiths might not take you in because they require a skill set that you might not have." Peter explained, "Of course it's all up to you."

"Peter, are there any guilds that could accept us?" Kanonno asked as Simon went deep into thought.

"All guilds can, it's required to not discriminate against sexuality, gender, or race." Stated Peter, "In fact I think the nonguild businesses in the guild district might be able to hire you."

"I see." Said Kanonno.

"To be honest, I'm more worried about you Kanonno than I am about Mari, since she can always work at a hospital as an emergency healer." Said Peter.

"It's true." Shrugged Marianya.

"Thanks." Grumbled Kanonno, as Simon wondered why he hasn't sneezed in hours.

"Sorry Kanonno, some people here just can't see a woman working as a mechanic." Sighed Peter

"I'll just prove that I'm just as good as a man." Said Kanonno.

"Good, now Simon have you figured out what to do?" Peter asked.

"I'm going to look for my memories, if I can't find anything then I'll probably try my luck again with Ad Libitum." Simon responded.

"Okay," Said Peter, "So we agree that Kanonno and Mari will look for jobs in their respective fields, and Simon will stay unemployed a might longer?"

"Since I'm gonna be stuck with the cleaning and what not," Said Laurel, "Yes."

"Great, can you guys help me clean the apartment?" Peter asked. Laurel and Marianya groaned while Kanonno laughed.

"Okay." Simon simply stated. Kanonno got started with the dishes, most of the time amusing herself with the faucet and the fact it spouted possibly drinkable water. Peter got into countless arguments with Marianya and Laurel about what should be thrown away and what should be kept. Those frequently got interrupted with Simon asking where he should put things. The usual responses were either "Put it in the closet" or "throw it away." Even then there were arguments about that, so Simon threw the junk away most of the time, except the things he viewed as valuable, in which case he put it somewhere in the bedroom. Eventually the apartment was cleaned up, dinner was cooked and after much arguing, went to sleep. Marianya and Laurel slept on the bed and the rest slept on the floor. The others slept peacefully while Simon tossed and turned, moaning in his sleep.

_ 'It's one of those dreams …' Simon thought 'where I'm someone else.' He looked into his faded reflection in the glass that looked into another room covered in metal. 'Looks like I'm a woman in this one.' He looked into the other room, the unfamiliar devices were covered by corpses, from the looks of it the men and women were torn limb from limb, and some of their faces looked like they had been ripped off. 'My god!' he thought wanting to back away from the window, but the body wouldn't move. He heard a door slam behind him, a man in a lab coat, locked the door and barricaded it._

_ "Do you have the chemical?" "Simon" found himself asking._

_ "Yes, but we don't have much time. This has to be destroyed." Said the man giving "Simon" a small flask with a stopper on it. "They're getting stronger, this won't hold them off for long." Just as he said those words they heard banging on the door, "Simon" started to run out of the room just as a bloody hand punched through the door. Halfway through the hallway he heard a pained scream, he didn't bother to turn back until he reached another room to shut the door and lock it. The room was filled with technology that was far more advanced than the technology in his time. He turned on a device, put the flask inside and slid something over the top. He turned on another device that looked like one of those cameras Kanonno obsesses about. _

_ "Is this working?" He muttered as he tapped the lens, "Good" He pressed a button revealing several images, the body started talking with words he doesn't understand, the body turned when he heard a bang._

_ "Your majesty please, we need to seal them away," He found himself saying, keeping his eye on the door. "There's no hope letting them run loose, we can't start over with them still around." He took out a gun, as he could hear the lock going loose. "I'm sorry, I never meant for this to happen." _

_ 'What's going on?' Simon thought as the body stood there, 'Isn't there another exit? Run!' The body stood in place, not bothering to turn off the camera. 'I don't want to know what happens next, wake up.' Nothing happened as the door opened showing the people with skin covered in blood, and clothes, though the clothes contained an odd pigment, Simon could have sworn he saw fingers hanging around the necks._

_ 'Wake up,' He thought as the body started firing at the people, "Wake up!" The people ran toward him, and he pointed the gun to his head, "WAKE UP!" He heard a gunshot as everything went black._

Simon jolted up, panting, he looked around realizing he was in Peter's apartment. He lay back down.

_'It was just a dream.'_ He thought, _'Just a scary dream.'_ For the rest of the night he couldn't get back to sleep.

**XXX**

**Meet Peter, another character that was supposed to be minor, after fifteen chapters we're finally getting to a story arc, I think I might have said this chapters ago, that time I lied, but I'm honest about this. Though I will introduce several characters. I'm sorry to say that anyone from the Speg branch has been put on a bus. Yes, I did base the look of Franklin off of Baticul and do some of these settings look a little too modern?**


	16. Chapter 16: Starting off

Chapter 16: Starting off

**Last time Kanonno and Marianya introduced their friend Peter, who warned them about not finding any jobs. Please correct me on anything I've might've screwed up on.**

**XXX**

Peter left early that morning, fortunately he did leave some bread behind, they just had to cut off the mold. He also left out a map of the city along with a sloppy copy. Kanonno looked at the map.

"How sweet." She said munching on some bread, "So who wants what copy?"

"Does the copy at least have a hospital on it?" Marianya asked.

"Let's see…" Muttered Kanonno looking over the map. "Yep, Franklin's local hospital." She handed the map to Marianya. Simon peered over her shoulder.

"You need directions on the library?" Marianya asked, moving the map a little bit to the right.

"Sorry …" He muttered.

"It's fine, are you finished yet?" Sighed Marianya.

"...Yep." Marianya moved the map away from him.

"See you later, wish me luck." Kanonno said hastily leaving the door. The door slammed before the other three could say something. Marianya left soon after, then Simon left, leaving Laurel in the apartment. Simon took a trolley to a cable car station, he took the cable car to the area where the library should be, the public section, a level dedicated to public facilities, making up the middle ring of the city.

_'I question the architects' decisions when they developed this city.'_ Simon thought but shrugged off as he headed towards the library._ 'Who knows, I might run into Marianya while I'm here.'_ His mouth dropped when he got inside the library. It was very large, possibly the largest in the world, books nearly towards the ceiling, Simon wondered if there were ladders that went that high. _'Where am I going to find things on amnesia?'_ He sighed looking around, _'Okay, sciences should be…'_ He thought looking at the spines of the books.

"These don't tell us anything!" He heard a female voice whisper.

"But we can't give up yet, we just have to keep looking." A male voice encouraged, as Simon found a book on amnesia, he flipped through it, relived that it wasn't fiction.

"But this is just generic knowledge." Said the female voice when Simon approached a table with the blonde boy he saw yesterday and a girl with short dark brown hair, dressed like she was part of the upper class, but she had a bandages on her cheek and around her hands.

"But these books might have something that we don't know!" The blonde whispered to the girl.

"What? These say the exact, same things our books say?" The girl whispered back, nearly raising her voice.

"Am I interrupting anything?" Simon asked quietly, sitting down. The boy's eyes widened.

"No … not at all." The girl whispered back.

"What are you doing here? And did you find your friend?" The boy asked.

"I'm looking for ways to jog my memory, and yes I did find that man." Simon asked, "Are you successful in your research for the Apocalypse Period?"

"How do you know that?" Shouted the boy, getting shushed by people in the surrounding area.

"You slipped up and told me yesterday." Simon reminded.

"Oh …" Sighed the boy, blushing a bit, the girl with him shook her head.

"We're not very successful." The girl whispered, "Though why are you looking for ways to help with amnesia?"

"I have amnesia, so I would like to know something about my past." Said Simon, _'Since it's now imperative that I find my memories to get a non guild job. Also I started to remember things on the white rabbit.'_

"Oh, I'm sorry." Said the girl.

"It's okay," Said Simon skimming over sections of the book. "I've started regain something of a memory." He found a section of the book that discusses how to reverse amnesia and read it. _'Hm … I don't think it would be as easy as the book says it is, though, I did get something with Captain Reynolds and Siela might know me. Dammit, Captain Reynolds is probably gone by now and Siela is in Sakriny and she hasn't contacted me through my dreams in a while.'_

"Hey, can you help us with our research?" The boy asked.

"No thanks, I have my own project to worry about, but if you can't find anything in the books you can ask the front desk for documents about the time or other sources." Simon shrugged.

"We have some friends looking at documents." Said the blonde.

"We should probably check on them, don't you think?" The girl asked. The boy nodded and they left.

At the same time Kanonno was looking for a job for any type of handiwork, she didn't care if she worked as a mechanic or on an assembly line, she would be happy to earn some money. So far, she's been rejected from each job she asked about, because of either her gender or her nationality.

_'Never thought that people would become so suspicious because you're from Sakriny.'_ She thought, _'It's not like I'm a spy or anything, might as well try the guild district.'_ She looked at the map covered in x's she drew on there. She headed to the guild district, on the way there she saw Luke coming her way.

"Oh hello," he greeted, "What brings you here?"

"I'm looking for some work," She replied. "You?"

"I'm on a mission." He said, "I have to go, I can't keep my group waiting."

"Before you go, do you know who's hiring in guild district?" Kanonno asked.

"I don't know any specific guilds that are looking for members at the moment." Luke shrugged, "Though, I did hear something about a man named Rusty looking to hire."

"Thank you," she said.

"No problem." He replied before the two went on their separate ways. Once in the guild district she started asking around for the man named Rusty. She learned that he is a mechanic that runs a garage, called Wrench Monkeys, mainly fixing vehicles, people also told her that it was at the edge of the district. She walked there and noticed that it was small, it looked run down, there were only two vehicles in it, two people were each working on a vehicle. The garage looked like it hadn't been doing so well lately. She knocked on the side of the garage.

"Excuse me!" She then said, catching some attention. "I'm looking for Rusty, I heard he was hiring."

"You heard right," Said a young man with shoulder length green hair in a mechanic's suit. "The boss is a bit desperate for workers, if you fill …" the young man walked over to a work bench scrambling through boxes until he pulled out a piece of paper and a pen, "out this paperwork the boss might consider. Just give it to him when you're done." He said pointing to a separate room.

"All right," said Kanonno taking the pen and paper, she started filling any blanks on the paper work, she checked off specific days of the week and hours when she's available. She walked over to the small room, and saw a middle aged man scribbling on paper work, getting grease smudges on it. She tapped at the side of the wall.

"Waddya want missy?" He snapped.

"I'm here for a job you're offering." She said, handing him the paper work. He took it, looked it over and looked at her.

"You're awfully scrawny for someone with past experience." He commented.

"I'm about as scrawny as any of your other workers, so I don't see any reason why I shouldn't work for you." She argued back. Rusty laughed.

"I like your attitude Missy." He mused, "I'll consider letting you in, if you can fix this." He handed her a destroyed bug looking device and what she assumed to be it's remote control. "Use any tools at your disposal." She looked at the device, then took some welding equipment, with protection, screws, screw driver, and a small wrench. She tinkered with the device before soldering some wires together then screwing on the legs and the neck of the device. She then took apart the remote, revealing frayed wires, she wondered how that happened before soldering together the wires and putting the remote back together. She finished the piece by wielding on some pieces of metal that seemed to have melted off somehow and screwed a metal plate on its back after the metal had cooled. She pressed a button on the remote and the device sprang to life she moved the stick on the remote and it started to move.

"Impressive, can it meld things together?" Rusty asked, Kanonno pressed a different button and the device's glass head shot a beam of red light, it didn't meld anything but it left a large black streak on the concrete. Rusty nodded, "Come back tomorrow." Kanonno looked at him confused, "You're in."

"Really?" Kanonno said surprised, after a long day of rejections.

"Yes, come back tomorrow morning at seven." Said Rusty.

"Th-thank you." She said before leaving the garage she cheered once she got out.

Meanwhile, Simon read the book on amnesia, he stopped for a while and took the book the boy and girl were reading. It discussed weapons of the era and it showed a picture of a giant cannon looking object on a metal rod, the caption read "Spear of Kresnik." His eyes widened as he spaced out into a flashback.

_"Yes sir this baby has the destructive power to destroy everything, even the spirits. This has the power equivalent of the gods." A man in a lab coat said patting the control panel of the Spear of Kresnik._

_ "Will it prove to be prosperous?" He found himself asking but his voice sounded different, it sounded higher._

_ "This will help us take over Isanna's capital and win the war with ease!" Said the man. Then the flashback suddenly became fuzzy._

_ "Make it stop … no more … no more …" He heard a man sob._

_ "You need to sleep now." He heard another man say._

"Are you okay?" He heard the girl ask, "You were spacing out."

"Yeah, I think I might have gotten a memory." Said Simon, "Though there's one thing wrong with it, is there a country called Isanna?"

"Not anymore, the Isannan empire fell over five thousand years ago." The girl explained.

"I see, though I remember something about the Spear of Kresnik being able to kill spirits or something and it was meant to destroy the capital of Isanna." Simon explained.

"I knew it was a weapon of war, but I didn't know it could kill spirits." Said the girl. "Are you sure you don't want to help us with our research?"

"Well … I guess it won't hurt." Simon said standing up.

"Great!" Said the girl going up to him and dragging him, he noticed that she was paler than before and her walking seemed a bit wobbly. He slipped his arm away from her.

"I can get to the documents section on my own." He said, "Do you need to sit down or anything?"

"I'm fine." She said stopping, "I'm … just a bit tired."

"Okay," Said Simon walking to the section where he saw the blonde boy, the gas mask boy, and a young man with dark skin and white hair. The gas mask boy and dark skinned man were discussing something over a pice of paper, the boy looked just as pale as the girl and looked like he was going to fall over.

"Guys." The girl said catching the boys' attentions, "I brought someone that could help." Simon waved nervously.

"Hey what about your amnesia research?" The blond asked.

"Well your apocalypse period research kinda crosses over with my amnesia research." Simon shrugged picking up a document.

"Good enough, tell us if you find anything or what you have found." Said the gas mask boy.

"Speaking of which I learned that the Spear of Kresnik was able to kill spirits and it was intended to destroy the Isannan empire." Said Simon looking at a document with strange writing.

"You know we can ask a descendant of Kresnik to find out what it does." The blonde said to the gas mask boy.

"We did, remember, he might not have been Dr. Kresnik's descendant since there's five thousand years between then and now. There's plenty of time for the blood line to have been lost. Plus he didn't know anything on the weapon." The gas mask boy said. Simon froze.

_"Yggdrasil is dying and it's my fault, I didn't do anything to fix the mistakes of my predecessors." _Said the voice running through his head.

"Hey is something wrong?" The blonde asked. Simon snapped back to reality.

"Nothing." He lied.

"Did you find anything that could be useful?" The dark skinned man asked.

"Well, this … copy of a scroll seems to be in a different language, though there are some diagrams of some device." Said Simon giving the paper to the gas mask boy.

"It's written in Relarian, a long dead language." Sighed the gas mask boy.

"Excuse me," They heard a voice. They looked up to see a woman wearing thick rimmed glasses, "The library is about to close."

"Of course." Said the gas mask boy putting away the paper. The group left the library without borrowing a book.

"Hey thanks for the help um …" The blonde began.

"Simon, Simon Winters." Simon blurted, realizing that he forgot the basic thing to do when meeting new people, introducing himself.

"Oh right!" The blonde exclaimed, probably realizing the same thing, the gas mask boy rolled his eyes. "I'm Kyle Dunamis. The girl's Reala, the tall guy's Loni Dunamis, and that's-"

"Judas," the gas mask boy interrupted, "my name is Judas."

"Well … It's a pleasure to meet you." Said Simon.

"Will you be helping us tomorrow?" Reala asked.

"I might, but I've been considering the possibility of joining a guild, so we'll just see." Simon shrugged.

"Fair enough, see ya." Said Loni as the group separated. When he got back to the apartment he spotted Peter, carrying some groceries, in front of the door talking to a young man with blonde hair and blue eyes wearing an ordinary long coat and pants.

"I'm sorry Peter but I can't give you any information on what the guild's doing." The young man said.

"Oh come on Flynn, I'm just asking for a phone number or a radio signal." Peter begged.

"We went over this, B.V. is a small guild and they've told me that with other costs they can't afford a radio at the moment. Also, I am not in charge of B.V.'s activities. In fact, I'm hardly given any information on their status." Flynn explained.

"Can you at least ask your brother about Ad Libitum?" Peter asked.

"I'm afraid you'll have to ask him yourself, with work as it is now, I don't have much time to ask him." Flynn turned down.

"Er … Peter what's going on?" Simon interrupted.

"Ah! Simon!" Peter exclaimed.

"Is this one of your siblings?" Flynn asked.

"Sib-" Before Simon could finish the word Peter elbowed him.

"Yep, my amnesiac little brother, I just figured that any guild will help him in his quest to regain his memory. If only you can get some information on a guild." Said Peter.

"Nice try." Stated Flynn, "Despite your brother's condition it still doesn't change the fact that I can't give you information on the guilds. He's also probably irritated that you're making the decision of joining a guild for him." Simon shot Peter a glare. "End of discussion."

"But Flynn-" Peter started as Flynn started to walk off.

"End of discussion." Flynn reiterated as he walked down the hall towards the stairs.

"Were trying to get me into a guild?" Simon asked quirking an eyebrow.

"Well … not exactly, I was planning on getting information on the hiring status. I was planning on asking Flynn if the guilds are hiring, since I know he's associated with people in guilds. One thing lead to another and yeah, sorry about that." Peter explained.

"You know I can figure out if a guild's hiring on my own, and isn't it a bit early to be freaking out about the employment of your guest?" Said Simon.

"I wasn't freaking out, I was just merely curious." Peter muttered to himself opening the door to his apartment.

"By the way, who was that man and what's B.V.?" Simon asked.

"B.V. is the abbreviated term for the guild Brave Vesperia. That man, Flynn Scifo is the neighbor who lives a floor above us, he's an officer in the military but, like I said, he does know some members in Brave Vesperia and Ad Libitum. His brother lives here too, you'll probably meet up with him one of these days." Peter explained when the girls came back with some groceries, they seemed awfully happy, especially Kanonno.

"So how'd job hunting go?" Peter asked, helping the girls with the groceries.

"I'm an emergency healer at a clinic, you'd be surprise on the people that need to be healed quickly. It's also the only job I can get without a medical degree." Said Marianya, putting down some pots and pans.

"I'm a mechanic at a shop called Wrench Monkeys." Said Kanonno, slicing some vegetables not wanting Laurel to cause some sort of severe injury.

"Thank you Kanonno." Laurel grinned.

"Congrats you two, if I had any wine we could totally celebrate with a drink or something." Said Peter, Kanonno stuck out her tongue and made some form of dying sound.

"What's this a form of alcohol that you won't drink?" Marianya teased taking over for Kanonno.

"Wine is extremely bitter and it stains clothing, I prefer vodka, hell some beers are better than wine." Kanonno complained. "Speaking of which," she pulled out a bottle of vodka.

"How the- when the- what?" Laurel shouted, "Kanonno!" They heard pounding from a wall.

"Be a little more quiet Laurel, these walls are kinda thin and we could get kicked out if we're too loud." Peter informed, "Kanonno, don't be too loud when celebrating."

"You won't be hearing much from me," Kanonno promised. "Where are your shot glasses?"

"I'll get them." Peter sighed. Peter reached into a cabinet just as Laurel started cooking. Kanonno popped open the vodka bottle and poured some of it inside the pan Laurel was cooking in causing a flame to erupt from the pan Laurel screamed. Peter turned off the stove and covered the pan before removing it from the stove. Laurel and Peter scolded Kanonno on how dumping vodka into a very hot pan is a fire hazard. Marianya laughed and stood back with Simon.

"You know, we forgot to ask this, how is your memory search going along?" She asked.

"Well … I remembered something in the library but it didn't make sense, it involved some long extinct country." Shrugged Simon.

"Keep looking, you're probably gonna find something eventually." Marianya encouraged.

"Thanks." Said Simon, _'Hopefully your right.'_

Later, after dinner with the surprisingly not burnt vegetables and Kanonno muttering about something in her drunken state, everyone was asleep in the same arrangements as the previous night.

_Simon floated in black space, he smirked._

_ "It's been a while Siela." He said._

_ "Indeed, asking you to comeback is a bit of a hassle so I'm going to skip over that, you'll probably figure that out eventually." She sighed appearing out of nowhere. "I hope that it's not too late."_

_ "I wish that you would be forward with me on what I'm supposed to do." Simon sighed, "Can you tell me about my memories?"_

_ "What about them?" She asked._

_ "I just found a few memories but they seemed scattered," Simon began. "One memory is of Captain Reynolds while another is about the spear of Kresnik and a plot to destroy an ancient nation called Isanna. I can't draw any connections to them."_

_ "What about your dreams where you were another person?" Siela asked._

_ "How did you-" Simon began._

_ "Did you considered them as other memories?" She interrupted. Simon paused, "I would look at those they might also tell you about yourself and you're race."_

_ "Race what do you mean? I'm human, what else would I be?" Simon asked._

_ "You'll find out, when you figure out what's yours." She grinned before disappearing._

_ "Wait!" Simon called, but it was too late, she was gone, he stood along in the empty space. 'Reanalyze my dreams…' He thought, 'How am I going to- oh right, now I can control my dreams. Let's see, how about that first dream I had." He closed his eyes and appeared in the snow field with the girl crying in front of the grave stone._

**XXX**

**Gonna be introducing several characters from this point, I'll try my best to get the personalities as accurate as possible. So Siela's back though seeing her outside of the dream world might take a while longer. I won't be including Xillia 2 simply because it hasn't come out yet even though it'll be out when this fic might still be running. Though that doesn't mean that it won't be referenced from time to time. Also for the shippers, sorry to say that I won't be putting pairings in any time soon. Also I should tell you why I didn't describe how Marianya got her job, you see, I'm trying to get you not as attached with her as some of the other characters in case something happens to her.**


	17. Chapter 17: Day in a New Life

Chapter 17: Day in a new life

**Last time, Simon helped some kids in researching the Apocalypse Period as he tries to find his memories. While Kanonno landed a job at Wrench Monkeys. It's gonna start switching points of view from this point forward.**

**XXX**

Kanonno woke up with a splitting headache, she searched for a pocket watch to see it was six. She sat there for a moment before standing up, she caught herself when the blood rushed to her head, making her feel dizzy. She grabbed an apple, called it breakfast, and went out the door. She slugged down the stairs, feeling awful from that hang over as other people passed her.

"I shouldn't have drank that much, I need to get something for hangovers." She muttered as she left the building. She walked slowly toward a trolley stop, she found herself walking next to a man with white hair braided back and wearing a long coat. He was tall, not quite as tall as Peter but he's still tall. She could've sworn she saw that man before, she rubbed her head trying to think where she saw him, and because of her headache.

_'Oh duh! He's one of the workers from Wrench Monkeys.'_ She thought, she felt something grab the back of her shirt and pull her back. She caught herself from falling and looked up noticing a carriage was trotting by. She looked next to her to see the man had placed his arm back to his side, she looked to her other side to see if anyone was there, but there wasn't a soul.

"Uh … Thanks." She said.

"You're welcome." He replied. The two walked to the trolley loading platform in silence and waited for the next street car to come by. The atmosphere was quickly becoming tense between the two. The trolley came and they got on.

"So … you don't talk much do you?" She asked as the trolley started moving.

"… Not really." He stated. The two stood in silence for a bit longer.

"I'm Kanonno Vélvirki, you?" She introduced herself hoping to start a conversation.

"Veigue Lungburg." He stated.

"So … you work at Wrench Monkeys right?" She asked.

"Yes, and aren't you the person who asked about a job?" He said, she finally got him to say more than two words.

"Yes, yes I am." She said.

"How'd it go?" He asked, not looking at her.

"I'm in," she said rubbing her head, "how am I going to work with this headache?" She then muttered to herself.

"Did you celebrate a little too much?" He asked.

"There is no such thing as too much celebration and no, I was too busy bitching." She moaned, the trolley stopped and they got off.

"There is such a thing," The man argued calmly, "It's called death by intoxication. Hopefully that that hangover doesn't impair your skills."

"I hope so too." She sighed. The two walked in silence for a while longer until they arrived at Wrench Monkey's. Veigue hung up his jacket, grabbed a mechanic's suit, and put it on. Kanonno followed suit, except that she didn't have a jacket on her.

"Yo Veigue, what's up." The green haired man greeted as he wrapped his arm around. Veigue looked unamused and shoved the man's arm off him.

"Oh, you've joined the crew?" The man asked Kanonno.

"Yes." She stated bluntly.

"Tytree Crowe." The man said extending his hand.

"Kanonno Vélvirki." She replied shaking his hand.

"Let me introduce you to the rest of the crew, though you already know Veigue." Tytree offered.

"Okay," Said Kanonno feeling a bit better, following Tytree to one of the vehicles. A dark skinned woman with red hair and a young man with messy semi-long black hair wearing goggles worked on it.

"Mary, Jadeite," Tytree called, "This is our new member Kanonno."

"Jadeite Hearts." Said the young man going back to the vehicle.

"Mary Argent." Said the woman just as plainly and doing the same thing.

"Oh come on you two-" Tytree began to wine when their boss came out.

"Tytree! Kanonno!" Rusty shouted, "Quit your socializing and fix that flying machine, it's not going to fix itself."

"Yes sir!" They said at the same time, running to the personal vehicle Veigue worked on. Veigue rolled his eyes.

XXX

Some time after Kanonno left Simon woke up to notice that he was alone with Laurel washing dishes.

"Good morning Simon, your very cold breakfast is on the table." Said the flying cat not turning around.

"Thank you." Said Simon quickly eating the muffin and eggs. He left Laurel without another word and headed to the library. Once at the library he started to look for the people he was with the day before. He saw Luke looking for something, he changed his mind and tapped him on the shoulder. Luke turned around.

"You?" He whispered, Simon waved back, "What are you doing here?"

"I'm helping some people with some research while looking for my memory." Simon explained, "What about you?"

"I have the day off, so I'm looking for a book that a friend of mine needs." He replied, Simon noticed that Luke was carrying a book called _Mana and Mana Byproduct Diseases,_ Simon didn't comment on it. "Who are you doing this research for?" Luke asked pulling out a book.

"Some kids who want to know about the Apocalypse Period." Simon said, Luke froze and dropped the books. His face went pale while his hands twitched. "Luke?"

"Those documents should've never been picked up." He murmured to himself.

"What?" Simon asked.

"Listen Simon." Said Luke picking up the books, "You should give up on that research while your ahead." His voice sounded sad.

"Huh?"

"Keep going with your research and people will get hurt, including you, I would tell those children that as well." Luke warned.

"What if it's the only way to figure out my memory?" Simon asked.

"There are other ways to find it, last I checked you didn't care at which pace your memory came back. Leave it at that." Luke said before running away.

"Luke!" Simon tried to call but Luke was already gone. He continued looking for the four until he found them at a table with books and documents laid out all over the place.

"Haven't found anything I see." He said.

"Nope, we're trying to translate some of these documents, but it isn't going so well." Said Loni "I'm pretty sure that the Relarian dictionary we're using is faulty."

"Dictionaries are reliable resources for words, why would it be faulty?" Kyle asked.

"The meaning we got for this sentence is: "Fish in a lava flinging contest with prostitutes on an aglet." This clearly has nothing to do with fish or prostitutes since these diagrams appear to be mana flow charts." Loni argued.

"What's an aglet?" Simon asked sitting down and grabbing a book.

"It's a … I don't know." Said Judas, "I doubt it's relevant to this. I'll go look for another translators." He got up and left. Simon flipped through a book explaining the sealing of the spirits. It also explained the technological advances of the period and the devices that archeologists found with some sketches. One of the sketches looked like something from the dream where he was a woman giving a message.

_'That looks like the thing I talked into.'_ He thought, his mind slowly slipping into another memory.

_"He's dead!" He heard someone laugh, "He's finally dead!" was followed with more cackling, "The tyrant is gone we can now live in peace!"_

_ "You've gone too far!" He heard a woman say, "What's going to happen with him gone? What'll happen to Yggdrasil?"_

_ Then an image of a man with short brown hair wearing brown robes appeared in his head._

_ "I'm the only judge that hasn't lost his sanity." He said looking down at the ground, "Though if I don't rest, I'll end up like the rest of them." He laughed to himself sadly, "can I trust you with keeping our locations secret?" He asked closing his eyes before fading into nothing. A woman with pink hair in white robes shut a box, another woman with blue hair wearing black robes stood next to her, the two of them had pointy ears, the distinguishing marks of elves._

_ "Don't worry, we'll keep him safe." Said the pink haired woman referring to the box, "My people will make sure of it."_

"Siiiiimon… Simon!" He heard Kyle say snapping his fingers. "You all right?"

"Fine, another flash back." Said Simon, "I was wondering, were there any other races during the wars?"

"What type of question is that? Of course," Judas replied, back from his hunt for another dictionary. "Elves, gajuma, dwarves, half elves, if you can name it they were involved."

"What about spirits?" Simon asked.

"Yes, as we found out yesterday, some of them might have died at the time, including the theoretical spirits." Said Judas, "Why do you ask?"

"I had this memory that showed a pair of elves, vowing to keep some box safe." Simon said, "One of them had pink hair and the other had blue hair."

"It's probably nothing relevant." Judas scoffed off

"Why don't you look into a mythology book?" Loni suggested.

"Okay …" Said Simon getting up from his seat and looking for mythology books in a deeper part of the library where he found a very thick book on world mythology. He looked for a section on elves but he could only find mentions of elves throughout the book until he came across a section of the Nroby civilization.

_Nroby is the longest lasting civilization known to man._ The article read._ The Nroby civilization has lasted for about five thousand years. The Nroby people believe in a legend that says a pair of elven sisters referred to as Amateratsu, and Tsukiyomi lead survivors of the devastation from the war to an isolated island in the south seas. There they build a new civilization and it flourished while the rest of the world had to restart civilization from scratch. Whether or not Nroby's prosperity is because of the sisters' help is completely unfounded seeing that there is no evidence. Also, there is no evidence on if the elven sisters actually existed._

_ Another legend from Nroby concerns the spirit of time, Sekundes, it is believed that the spirit of time helped the elven sisters build their civilization to what it is today. Some people believe that Nroby has Sekundes sealed away within their city._

_'Sekundes?'_ Simon thought, _'Claus and Will didn't mention that spirit.' _Simon flipped through the book looking for something on Sekundes. He spaced out once again.

_"Come on!" Said a man that looked like a younger Captain Reynolds, "Your parents will love me."_

_ "I'm not so sure …" He found himself saying, like the memory with the Kresnik spear his voice seemed different, "You're not a rich man, they might make judgements."_

_ "It shouldn't matter, I really like you." the man said._

_ "Adrian…" He said, his eyes watering up._

Simon rubbed his eyes but they were dray, _'Did I just have another Captain Reynolds memory?'_

"Simon." He heard Judas say. "Did that book tell you anything?"

"Well a myth on how the Nroby civilization started. It mentioned a pair of elven sisters and the spirit of time." Simon explained.

"That information is useless." Judas dismissed going back to the table. Simon hesitated before putting the book away and went back to the table. Simon picked up a document and looked through it.

_'There's something wrong with my memory, I have a hunch that those elves were Amateratsu and Tsukiyomi but it's impossible for me to have been alive when they were around, as well as the Kresnik thing. There was also the incident with Captain Reynolds.'_ Simon thought, he remembered what Siela said about figuring out what's his. He looked at a picture of drawings of people and creatures and captions below them the words "He's dead" ran through his head while reading other documents.

XXX

Around noon at Wrench Monkeys, Kanonno was getting hungry. It was about time for a lunch break, the other four workers brought a lunch except her.

"Hey Kanonno, want any of my lunch?" Tytree asked offering a sandwich.

"Sure." She said taking the sandwich and eating it.

"So Mary how's-" Tytree began.

"We signed the papers, we're now officially divorced." She said sternly.

"Do you have any children?" Kanonno asked.

"No, we tried to have children but nothing happened." She said.

"Must be convenient not having to worry about custody, not that I would know." Kanonno took another bite of the sandwich. "What made you and your husband get a divorce?" Kanonno asked, next to her Tytree looked very uncomfortable.

"We've been fighting a lot, mostly over money, and we've been suspecting each other for cheating. The fighting got to a point where we had to cut it off." Mary explained, Tytree relaxed.

"Hey Veigue," Said Tytree changing the subject, "did you manage to pay off-"

"No." Veigue interrupted, mouth full.

"How are you and your sister?" Mary asked Jadeite.

"We're doing fine, though Amber has been insisting on joining the guilds lately." He shrugged, "We do need the extra money and she can defend herself but I can't help but worry."

"Same thing with me, except my sister was the one who was doing all the worrying." Said Tytree. The two went into a heated conversation about their sisters until Rusty ordered them to get back to work. The group worked on another aircraft that the guilds sent in. Kanonno and Tytree got inside and worked on the engine while the others focused on various parts of the craft. While replacing parts of the engine, Kanonno couldn't help but notice a scar on Tytree's arm, it looked like a carving of a tree. She brushed off the thought and noticed a similar scar on Veigue, except it looked more jagged. The thought on how painful the injury was crossed her mind before she concentrated back on her work.

XXX

Simon got up from the desk.

"I'm going out." He said walking off. He went to the front of the library and sat on the front steps, people walked past him not noticing he was there. His stomach growled, he looked in his pockets for spare change, nothing.

_'Darn.'_ He thought, he got up and was on his way to the apartment for some food, when he got to the general area where Peter lived he ran into Luke again. The two looked at each other quietly.

"Hey uh …" Simon began.

"Do you want to talk over tea? I'll pay." Luke asked.

"Sure." Said Simon. The two walked to a place that was very small, where people were talking on their break. He could've sworn he saw Asch in the corner talking to Natalia as the two took a seat at a table somewhat isolated from the crowd.

"I was wondering, why were you acting strange back at the library?" Simon asked.

"What?" Luke smirked as if he said something funny.

"You seemed shocked when I said that I'm looking into the Apocalypse period. You told me that I should give up on that research." Said Simon.

"I know," Sighed Luke, a waitress came by and asked if they wanted anything, Luke asked for black tea, as did Simon, with scones. "Let's just say that there are some things man is better off not knowing. That period is one of them." He leaned back into the chair.

"Didn't you learn about it?" Simon asked slouching, putting his elbows onto the table.

"Yes, and let's just say that I would be much better off without that knowledge." Said Luke.

"Why do you say that?" Simon asked as the waitress placed the teacups on the table with a teapot and a plate of scones in the middle. "Do you want any?" He asked reaching for a scone.

"No thank you." He said pouring himself a cup of tea and putting a couple of sugar cubes in it. "Where were we?"

"You were going to explain why Apocalypse period knowledge is something that you wish you didn't know." Said Simon pouring himself a cup.

"Right, that knowledge is something I would like to call 'Bad Knowledge.' It's not beneficial, it can be used to hurt others and can put damage on the psyche." Luke explained.

"If that's the case, how come you're a perfectly sane man with no murder record?" Simon asked.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" He laughed sadly. Simon figured that he should change the subject.

"What would you do if you were getting memories that seemed odd?" He asked.

"Hm?" Said Luke looking up, sipping his tea.

"Well what if you got memories that seemed to be in an era where it would be impossible for you to be alive, say a couple of centuries ago." Simon asked.

"In that case I would look into mana recycling." Luke answered leaning back, "There should be some resources in the library. Why?"

"… Happened to someone I knew." Simon lied.

"I see, though I've heard that now-a-days there are some problems in mana recycling." Said Luke.

"Why's that?" Simon asked munching on another scone, followed by a gulp of tea and coughed afterwords.

"I don't know." Shrugged Luke taking another sip, smirking at Simon's expression when he burned his throat.

"Luke!" Someone called, Luke looked up and Simon turned around, they saw a woman with long brown hair, tied back, though there was some hair over one of her eyes. Under a red corset, she had on a black dress with matching gloves and boots. The dress showed her red stockings underneath. The woman walked towards them, Luke's face seemed to lighten up.

"Ah Tear!" Luke greeted, "Good afternoon, what brings you here?"

"I wanted to check on you." She replied sternly.

"Is it because I do the same thing when you have a day off?" He asked with a chuckle.

"Don't flatter yourself Luke." She sighed.

"I know, but can we talk for a minute?" He asked nodding to the side.

"Oh, all right." She said glancing at Simon.

"Excuse us for a minute." Said Luke as he and Tear walked to the other side of the tea house well out of Simon's ear range. Simon looked down at the teacup pondering if he should continue the research or look into the mana recycling stuff. Occasionally he would look over his shoulder at Luke and his friend, Luke seemed to have lightened up from the Apocalypse period conversation. Simon looked back to the teacup pondering the topic. Luke sat back down.

"Sorry about that, Tear and I had some … guild related things to discuss." Said Luke.

"It's all right." Said Simon "You two seem to be really good friends."

"Ah yes … we are, she's a nice person, you should try to get to know her." Luke recommended.

"All … right …" Said Simon nervously. Later, after Luke paid for the tea, the two were walking down the streets, Simon was about to go back to the library when Luke grabbed his arm.

"Do you need any help sword fighting?" He randomly asked.

"Well … I haven't done any since Captain Reynolds-" Began Simon.

"Great, I know a place where you could practice." Said Luke.

"I can't right now." Said Simon.

"You're going back to that research?" Luke eyed him rather eerily.

"Well … I might do research on … mana recycling, my memory is kind of wonky and mana recycling might have something to do with it." Said Simon.

"All right." Said Luke still eyeing him as he slowly walked away. Simon didn't leave until he was sure Luke was gone. When he was back at the library, he found his group just as they were.

"Oh, your back." Said Judas, not looking up from his book. "We found someone who's able to translate Relarian."

"I see …" Said Simon feeling a bit down.

"You're still welcome to join us." Judas suggested.

"… Thanks." Said Simon sitting down and getting lost in a book.

**XXX**

**Why's Luke acting so suspicious? What's so important about the scars on Tytree and Veigue? Who's this other guy Judas mentioned? Who the hell are Amateratsu and Tsukiyomi, are they supposed to be a shout out to something? Is the Author is a bad writer? To answer that last question, maybe, and that extra help Kyle's gang got will be revealed in due time. Also this whole crazy lore for this world will, again, be revealed in … not anytime soon. Yes I am using Hisui's English name, I'm going to do the same thing to anyone with a localized name, with maybe an exception.**


	18. Chapter 18: Consider part time job

Chapter 18: Consider a Part-Time Job

**Last time, a relatively boring chapter.**

**XXX**

The next week was uneventful, Simon wasn't remembering anything in the library. Kanonno on the other hand was receiving some money. When it came time to pay the rent Peter was frustrated that he had to pay for Simon's share of the rent, even if Marianya insisted that she'd pay for him. In the end Peter had to pay for the rent.

"You know, I think you should give Peter a hand and get a job." Marianya said one night, Peter was going to be working late like he had been for the past week.

"Well I can't because of my memory." Simon sighed.

"Who cares! Peter's been working late because of you. If you're so concerned about skills you can go ask a guild for help or something." Marianya argued.

"Most of the guilds here require a skill set that I might not have." Simon argued.

"Both of you, calm down!" Kanonno snapped just as Peter started to come in, "Mari, you're still adjusting to your job and you're more stressed now that Peter's been working late. Also, Simon, your memory will come back, just give it time though. Hey, I'll pay for your rent while you look. I would tell Peter if he was here to not worry about the rent and concentrate on his work."

"You're probably right, I'm under a lot of stress right now, wages have been cut at the factory so I have to work late to keep myself afloat." Sighed Peter.

"Oh Pete-" Kanonno exclaimed.

"It's fine, and thanks for offering to pay for Simon while he's still unemployed, it helps a lot." Said Peter going into the washroom. Simon sighed frustrated as he heard water running.

"What is it now Simon, sick of being a financial burden or something?" Kanonno said rolling her eyes.

"It's only been a week and it sounds like I'm too expensive." He growled.

"Not really, the share of the rent is only a couple hundred gald which can be paid off relatively quick in hind sight." Kanonno shrugged. "Just don't stress out over this, everything will work out eventually."

_'I've never heard her say such laid back things.'_ Simon thought.

XXX

The next day at the library he continued to look through documents but couldn't find anything on the Apocalypse period. He read through the translated documents but the other four already knew the material.

"How are you doing with your research?" A feminine voice asked, Simon looked up to see Judas talking to a young student with green hair and wearing a uniform of some sort.

"We're doing fine, thank you for translating those documents." Said Judas, "It was a big help."

"You're welcome, I'm just glad I could be able to help." Said the student giving Judas a piece of paper, "I have to get going, but if you need anything just let me know." The student left without a single word. Simon couldn't help but wonder who the stranger was.

"Hey Judas, I think I found something." Said Kyle, pointing to something in a translation.

"Let me see," said Judas putting down the first document, walking over and taking the paper. He rubbed his chin.

"What does it say?" Reala asked. Loni peeked over his shoulder.

_"The Patriarch of the divine fell by the hands of man. Over their frustration life and death lost themselves. Death went to war with the living while life's sanity diminished. The singularity fell into despair, doing nothing to console the two, becoming nothing more than a doll. Time insisted that the three sleep and wait for someone to take the Patriarch's place, life and the singularity agreed and fell asleep The former slept among the people while the latter rested among the trees with twists. Death refused. Time fought death until time sealed death away in the valley of ghosts. Then time fell asleep into the arms of a pair of sisters who …"_ Loni read out loud, "And the rest is missing." The memory of the elven sisters appeared in Simon's mind again.

"Thank you for that." Growled Judas.

"Wait … what does it mean?" Kyle asked, "The Patriarch, life, death, time, and the singularity are they a metaphor or are they actual people?"

"I assume that this is a metaphor for the times but you might be on to something Kyle." Said Judas reading over the document again.

"I am? Oh well …" Kyle blushed.

"Are you suggesting that the five um … concepts may be actual people?" Loni asked.

"I … I don't know, the way they're saying life, death and whatever may be metaphors for important figures during the time." Kyle suggested.

"What if … they're not … human?" Simon asked trailing off.

"Simon? What do you mean?" Reala asked.

"Spirits." Said Simon, "What if they're titles given to spirits?" Judas put down the document and started pacing around.

"Spirits …" he muttered, "would explain the Patriarch, but sleep … what does "sleep" mean?" He was starting to make Kyle dizzy pacing around the table. He finally sat back down and picked up the document the student gave him. "We'll leave that as a possibility." As hours passed nothing came to Simon. He felt like he was going mad while the others didn't seem be unaffected. He got up, he decided he was done for the day and left the library.

_'What am I going to do? Well, I could try to join a guild, doing the guild test was actually … fun. I have the experience but what if I'm rejected again? What if I do a poor job, because the last time I did it wasn't exactly great. What if I forgot how to fight out of nervousness?' _The anxieties running through Simon's head, he didn't notice he ran into a woman.

"Watch where you are going!" She shouted.

"Ah, sorry." He apologized, "Chloe?"

"Oh, you're … Simon is it?" She replied, he nodded, "How is life in Franklin?"

"I've been very … dependent on my roommate." He said, blushing on the word, dependent, "I'm considering joining a guild but the question is which one should I join and will they accept me? Also how am I going to keep up with research?"

"You know, you don't have to be a full fledged guild member to be in a guild." Said Chloe.

"What do you mean?" Simon asked as the two started walking in a random direction, heading into parts of the city Simon wasn't familiar with.

"I mean you can be a part-time member, part-time members aren't devoted to a single guild and can have a job outside the guilds." She explained.

"Wait, people in guilds can't have jobs outside?" Simon asked

"Yes, because of that restriction members that had a previous job had to quit. If you're a part-time member you can keep your job and work for the guild when the guild calls you, in some cases." Chloe explained, "Though the pay isn't all that great, if you want the money."

"So, are they like part time workers?" Simon asked.

"Yes, the name should've told you." Chloe shrugged approaching a bench.

"Um … thank you." Said Simon sitting down next to her, "Where are we?"

"We're still in the public section." She stated simply.

"Oh okay, I haven't been to this part."

"Figures, Franklin is a big city it'll take at least a year to see everything in the city." She said.

"Really, St. Gabriel wasn't nearly this big, even though there are still things I haven't seen there." Simon said with widened eyes. "By the way, how do you know about this part-time stuff?" He said changing the subject.

"I am one, since I'm a body guard for the president and his family I have to make sure that Natalia is safe, so that's why I'm a part-time member." Chloe informed.

"So why do people know of Natalia?" Simon asked remembering the reactions in St. Gabriel.

"She's a guild member with reputation, and she helped the president at times. Since she can't hold a political position until she's 25, the best she could do now is give the president suggestions on bills and what not. So far, her suggestions have been in the best interest of the country." Chloe explained, "Though let's keep the suggestion thing between you and me, I don't want the public getting suspicious about it."

"I won't let the thought cross my mind." Simon promised.

"Good. Anyway, do you want to register for being a part-time member?" She asked, going back to the part-time subject.

"Sure, I'll try it." Simon shrugged, "What do I need to do?"

"Go to Ad Libitum's headquarters in the guild district, You'll figure out the rest." Chloe instructed.

"Thank you," Said Simon getting up and taking a cable car to the guild district. He wandered around regretting that he should've asked for directions first. He muttered to himself as he wandered.

"Excuse me," He heard someone call, he turned to see a young girl with pink hair tied up wearing a green jacket with a reddish shirt underneath along with a pair of short pants and a pair of stockings covering her legs. "You seemed to be lost, do you need any help?"

"Ah … no thank you." Said Simon walking away.

"Are you sure?" She said intercepting him.

"Yes, I'm sure." Said Simon growing nervous and backing away.

"But are you sure sure? Not "pretty sure," "mostly sure," or "very sure?" You're absolutely one hundred percent sure?" The girl asked backing Simon into a corner.

"Yes, I'm sure." Simon replied.

"You're saying "yes" but your eyes say "no." Should I trust your word?" The girl asked.

"Now now Chelsea, don't scare the man." Said a dark skinned man with white hair, blue eyes, and in similar attire as Simon, but more formal.

"But Mr. Kelvin-" The girl began.

"He can take care of himself, run along now." Said the man.

"Fine." She growled walking off with a shrug.

"Sorry about that, she tends to get a little carried away." Said the man.

"Oh … well … thank you I guess?" Said Simon.

"There's no need to thank me, I'm just making sure that Chelsea doesn't get into trouble." He said.

"No trouble," Said Simon, "I just need to find directions Ad Libitum's headquarters."

"I see, you should've just said so, it would make you a lot less uncomfortable." The man mused to himself, Simon blushed. "Pardon me." The man said clearing his throat. "It's down that way, just take a left there should be a sign, you can't miss it." The man pointed to his right.

"Thank you." Said Simon walking down the street the man pointed to. He followed the directions exactly until he got to a concrete building that had "AD LIBITUM" in big red wooden letters nailed above the door. _'This is it.'_ He thought confidently. He entered the building to see the lobby completely empty. No one sat in the chairs, or in the desk across from them, and the board across from him had job postings but no one came to claim them. He went to the front desk to see it spotless, except for the hand bell on the right corner. He picked up the bell and gave it small ring no one came, he rang it again but louder. A woman with blond hair tied back and wearing a vest and skirt under a jacket came from the door behind. Simon put down the bell.

"Do you need something?" She asked, her stare made him nervous.

"Um … I …" He stuttered, sweating, "I'd like to … sign up for being a part-time member." The woman examined him.

"You'd like to be a parter you say?" She asked.

"Um … y-yes mam." He replied, assuming 'parter' meant the same thing.

"Have you been experienced with guilds before?" She asked.

"Yes mam, I … I tried to join Ad Libitum in St. Gabriel." Simon explained.

"Any reason why you want to be a parter?" She asked.

_'Oh god I didn't think this through.' _Simon thought, _'Maybe I could use the research as an excuse? Sorry Judas ...'_

"I'm … doing some research for a project and it's very ... time consuming. This is just a way to get money while I'm doing research." He said.

"Is this for any company?" She asked.

"Independent, I'm not getting paid mam." He stated. The woman examined him again, she sighed. She ducked under the desk, he heard the shuffling of papers, she came back up and gave him some paper work, an inkwell, and a quill. She signaled to one of the chairs in the lobby, Simon hesitated before taking the paper work and moving to one of the chairs. He read through and filled out as many blanks as he could, all the while listening in on conversations between guild members passing. He finished the paper work with a signature that looked like a chicken walked on the paper. He walked up to the desk and gave the woman his finished paper work as well as the ink well and quill. The woman grimaced over the paper work.

"Is there some thing wrong?" He asked, feeling nervous.

"Your hand writing is barely legible. I'm not sure how the people in Speg were able to read this chicken scratch." She criticized, Simon's face turned red. "I'll be right back." She went to the room behind the desk. Simon went back to one of the chairs, sat down and stared at his feet while twiddling his thumbs. He head a group come in.

"Looks like Van and Legretta are out." He head a familiar voice say.

"Well let's just turn in the report and wait for the pay." Another very familiar voice suggested.

"Sounds plausible but what are we going to do while we wait?" Another voice asked, but Simon didn't know this one.

"We can just take another job or socialize with him." One of the voices suggested. There was a silence, Simon couldn't help but wonder if the group was talking about him.

"Really?" Said another voice, sounding slightly miffed.

"Yes, it wouldn't kill us." Defended the one of the voices walking towards something. "Hey Simon, are you home?" He looked up to see Luke with a smirk on his face. Behind him, near the desk, Asch rolled his eyes and walked to the guild's board with another man who looked exactly like Peter's neighbor though he seemed more relaxed. His attire also seemed less formal that Peter's neighbor, and for some reason he was wearing a blouse.

"Er … hi." He replied.

"Fancy seeing you here, what brings you to the guild's H.Q.?" He asked.

"I'm here to sign up to be a part-time member." Simon explained.

"Why a parter? You can only get at maximum twenty percent of the guild's share if you choose to accept pay." Said Luke.

"I have other things to do, I'm willing to accept that low pay if it'll get me to pay the rent." Said Simon leaning back.

"What other things have you been doing exactly?" Luke asked, his stare turning cold. "Is it that research with those children?" Simon froze and backed himself to the wall. Luke's hand twitched about to move to his side, Simon's breathing became uneasy.

"Whoa, settle down Luke, there's no need to get tense." The man interrupted putting his hand on Luke's shoulder, Luke stiffened. "What this man does in his time is none of our business, and I'm sure that it's not going to affect us."

"I guess your right Guy, as usual." Said Luke relaxing, Simon looked on confused.

"And Asch, put that away." The man said without even turning. Simon looked past Luke and saw Asch put away his sword.

He muttered something related to: "dammit," and turned his attention back to the board.

"Sorry about that Simon." Luke apologized, he then looked in a different direction, "I'm just under a lot of … stress. The way I'm acting is no excuse." He then walked to the boards, Simon was even more confused.

"What just happened?" Simon asked.

"Don't mind them, they have trouble getting along with others." The man said, "By the way, I'm Guy, Guy Cecil."

"Simon Winters." He introduced himself, "Do you have a brother? I mean I've seen someone like you-" Guy stopped him.

"Yes, I do have a brother." He answered, "We're twins actually."

"I never would've guessed." Muttered Simon, knowing that he, of all people, could figure that much out. The woman came back out, she looked at the report the three handed in.

"Luke, Asch, Guy." She called. The three came over and talked silently about the job and received their pay. Guy nodded at Luke went up the stairs, Luke looked over and followed suit while Asch looked at the board.

"Winters." The woman called, Simon jolted up and walked quickly to the desk. "Your application form is being looked over, come back tomorrow." Simon nodded and left the building. He wondered what he should do with the rest of his time when he felt someone grab his shoulder. He was spun around to be caught by Kanonno.

"Hello." She smirked as he straightened himself, he saw a man standing next to her. "Finally decided on that guild work?"

"Kanonno?" Simon exclaimed.

"Before you ask what I'm doing here, I work here and work's closing for the day." She said pointing to the sky, he looked up and noticed that the sun was setting.

_'How long was I in there?'_ Simon thought.

"Is this a friend of yours?" The man next to her asked.

"Yeah, he's a roommate." She said to the man next to her, then turning to Simon. "Simon, this is a coworker, Veigue, he lives in the same district as we do."

"The residential district where a good majority lives." Veigue muttered under his breath.

"Any way Simon, if this is about the rent thing, I told you I can take care of it, you just try to gain back your memory." She said as they started walking to the trolley station.

"I know but I do need to take care of myself, and the past week without remembering anything new, like my actual name, is driving me crazy. I just need a break from it." Said Simon.

"Don't push yourself, your memory will come back in due time, take a break if you need to." Kanonno encouraged, Simon smiled, he hadn't seen this kind Kanonno since she smuggled him out. Then he felt guilty thinking he had taken advantage over Kanonno. She had helped him out through a lot and he didn't do anything to return the favor, minus the gald giving event when they reunited. That gald ended up getting wasted on alcohol and clothes.

"Is something wrong?" Kanonno asked as they stopped at the station.

"I'm feeling a bit guilty having you pay off all the rent, I think it's only fair that you don't pay all of my rent, at least until I've made enough money on being a part time member or get my memory back, whichever comes first." Said Simon.

"Fine, but you have to keep up your end of the deal, even if you can only pay one gald." Kanonno accepted.

"I don't mean to interrupt, but what is this on amnesia?" Veigue asked.

"I lost my memory over a month ago and it's proven to be a problem when finding a job." Simon sighed.

"Not to mention you managed to loose your clothes in the middle of winter and blanked out when we mentioned Moslin." Kanonno grumbled. "Though since then you seem much less clueless about locations."

"I see, never though that it would be as discriminatory as some other disorders." Veigue muttered to himself.

"Did you say something?" Simon asked Veigue.

"No." Veigue as the crowd coming from work shoved them to the back.

"What's this about being a part-time guild member?" Kanonno asked Simon as a trolley picked up the people. It was filled to the brim before taking off without them. They'd had to wait for the next train.

"Well I want to spend some time on looking for my memory as we discussed." Said Simon.

"And it'll be a step closer to figuring out what you are, among other things." He heard someone, a young girl, say behind him. He turned around and saw no one.

"Is something wrong?" Kanonno asked.

"I thought I heard something," he said as another trolley came, "it's probably nothing." They got onto the trolley and hardly said a thing on the way to the residential district. Though Simon couldn't shake the feeling that he was being watched. When he turned around again he saw a black blur went by. He leaned back to see if he could get a better look.

"What are you doing Simon?" Kanonno asked.

"Nothing." Simon said quickly, shrugging.

"Is your friend normally like this?" Veigue asked.

"No, he's usually very mild mannered, it's not like him to be this wary." Kanonno replied.

"Sorry, I just had this feeling like we're being watched." Simon apologized.

"Really …" Said Veigue looking over his shoulder, then he turned back. "Are you sure?"

"It's probably nothing." Simon brushed off.

"Are you sure?" Kanonno asked again.

"If I don't see anything, it's most likely a groundless fear, right?" Simon concluded.

"If that's what you think, then, sure it's just paranoia." Said Kanonno shrugging, and going along with Simon's logic. Once they got off they walked a little ways and then parted with Veigue. He went to the building across the street.

XXX

_"Siela, was that you?" Simon asked in the dream space._

_ "What was me?" Siela asked in response sitting on nothing, a mischievous grin plastered on her face._

_ "That voice that said that being a part-time guild member will be one step closer to figure out what I-"_

_ "I know, I'm teasing." Siela interrupted._

_ "Were you at the station when you said that?" Simon asked._

_ "Of course not, I'm still on Yggdrasil's stump, me being there must be your imagination." Siela stated._

_ "Then how were you able to tell me that?" Simon asked._

_ "That's my little secret, I'll tell you in due time." She smirked placing a finger in front of her lips._

_ "Like anything else." Simon sighed._

_ "Speaking of which don't you have any searching to do?" Siela questioned._

_ "What do you-" Before he could finish, he felt himself falling into one of those dreams where he was someone else. From the surroundings he assumed he was the woman that gave a message about the people out for her blood._

_ "Now are you sure that this device can do what you said it can do?" "He" asked a man, his hand on what appears to be the Spear of Kresnik._

_ "Like I said hon, this will make us gods by winning the war for us." The man said sounding cocky and deranged._

_ "Can it really destroy spirits?" "He" asked again._

_ "Yes, this is what I wanted to show you." He snapped his fingers a group of men dragged in a cage the bars were a blue substance that looked like lightning. Inside the cage was something that looked like a woman wearing all white. "This is a minor spirit from the southern islands." The man introduced turning on the machine. The woman's face was struck with horror as she pounded on the sides of the cage when she saw the machine turned on. The machine buzzed as mana gathered at the tip, a beam shot out of the machine, piercing through the cage and the head of the spirit. She screamed and started to fade. Simon shuttered._

_ 'What the hell is this?' He thought watching the spirit disappear from existence. The man turned off the machine._

_ "Well? What do you think?" He asked._

_ 'What do I think? This is a monstrosity!' Simon thought._

_ "What does it use for energy?" "Simon" asked._

_ "Why it drains mana from the earth and small amounts from every living being within a 10 mile radius. Though it mainly drains from plants, but it's worth it." The man said. "Simon" looked at a potted plant that was dying, flower petals fallen and the leaves were yellowing. Simon tried to hold back a gasp._

_ "It's a small price for replacing spirit powered machines." "He" said._

_ 'Spirit powered? What have you been doing?' Simon shouted._

_ "Simon!" He heard someone shout._

_ "Simon wake up!" He heard again._

Simon jolted awake causing Peter to jump.

"Peter? When did you get home?" He asked.

"Not too long ago, but are you okay? You seem to be having a bad dream." Peter questioned, sounding concerned.

"How can you tell?"

"You were mumbling things in your sleep, at one point you sounded like you were about to scream." Peter explained.

"Oh …" Simon muttered curling up in a ball.

"Hey, do you want to talk about it?" Peter asked, rubbing his back. Simon stayed silent. "You don't have to if you don't want to." He continued getting up. He went to the cabinets and did some digging for some ingredients and tea leaves.

"Um … I would like to talk about it." Simon finally said as Peter put the tea leaves in a water filled kettle.

"You would?" Peter asked lighting a match and throwing it under the stove. "Why don't you come over and sit down?" Simon went to the table and sat on a stool scavenged from an alley a few days back. "By the way, are you hungry?" Peter asked chopping up some vegetables and fruit.

"No." Said Simon, as Peter put the ingredients for his dinner in a pan and stirred it around.

"What's been troubling you?" Peter asked sitting in a chair across from Simon.

"Well …" Simon began, looking down.

"Don't be afraid to speak up." Peter encouraged, Simon looked up and nodded.

"You see …" Simon began again as he told his dream. He didn't mention the part about Siela but mentioned every other bit of the dream. By the time he finished the tea kettle started boiling and Peter got a couple of cups and poured the tea in them. He gave a cup to Simon before getting himself a plate for his dinner.

"That is pretty disturbing." Peter said sitting back down, "It sounds like a bad memory from that period."

"I've had flashbacks similar to that, where people are on the brink of madness." Simon said looking into the tea cup. "Though those flashbacks are from the Apocalypse Period, I couldn't have possibly been alive back then."

"It's most likely a day dream." Said Peter, completely ignoring his dinner, "I think you shouldn't let those get in the way of your life."

"But what if they are memories and I'm actually five thousand years old? How am I-?" Simon began to question until Peter placed a hand over his own hand.

"Calm down, even if you were some sort of immortal being it shouldn't interfere with your current life. I'm sure if there is some dirt in your past it'll be resolved." Peter comforted, "I'm not sure what'll happen but I do know that eventually, everything will be okay."

"Really?" Simon asked.

"Positive." Peter reassured eating some of his dinner, "now drink that tea, it'll soothe you and put you out for the rest of the night."

"What?" Simon exclaimed, worried if there's a drug in the tea.

"There's nothing in the tea, it's just a remedy my mom made to put me back to sleep when I had nightmares." Peter explained, "I managed to copy the recipe before I got kicked out."

"Thanks." Said Simon drinking the tea, soon after he went to sleep.

**XXX**

**Back to the guilds we go! Along with some character development for Peter. Also, if you're wondering about Van and Legretta, it's going to be like Radiant Mythology 3 where there is absolutely no reason for them to be evil, though that's not gonna stop them from beating up our protagonist.**


	19. Chapter 19: Again?

Chapter 19: Again?

**Last time on Tales of the World: New Age Mythology … Simon decided to join the guild, again, Luke is still acting suspicious. While Simon might be going crazy.**

**Sorry I haven't updated in a while, college has been busy and I had some things going on with my health so things have been hectic. Don't expect the next chapter until months from now. Sorry.**

**XXX**

The next morning, Kanonno and Simon went off to the guild district at the same time, which Laurel noted was strange.

"It's just going to work, except I have some company." Kanonno noted. The two met up with Veigue as they went to the guild district. They parted ways when Simon got to the guild's headquarters, the building was busy, members rushing in and out, turning in reports and receiving jobs. He was shoved out of the way so other members could get through. He saw a few familiar faces in the rush but was unable to make eye contact. He managed to get to the front desk where the woman gave him a stern look and pointed to the door behind her. He assumed she meant for him to get in, so he walked behind the desk and entered the door behind her. The room only had a bookshelf and a desk, it was pretty empty. Simon looked around and went up to the book case he looked at the spines until he found a book called _"Unique artifacts."_ He pulled it out and flipped through the pages he skimmed over pages about pots and art from ancient times, not as ancient as the Apocalypse period, but still over a thousand years old. Then he came across an interesting article called: "_Subject: S013."_

_ "This was found in some ruins close to present day Matha, Speg. This is one of the few artifacts that prove artificial humans exist, primarily robotic humans. Unfortunately the team that exavated her found her in pieces."_ Simon read.

_'Her?' _Simon thought before continuing to read.

_"With current technology we are unable to put her back together, but she is beneficial in studying what these robotic humans were used for. From the extensive damage to her exterior we can assume that she was used for warfare, and was probably destroyed during a battle."_ Simon then looked at a sketch of S013, it was detailed, showing a young girl with long hair and eyes closed some skin torn off showing the metallic skeleton underneath and the cybernetic eye. Frayed wires replaced an arm and a leg.

"You should ask for permission before looking through someone's personal items." He heard someone say behind him. He squeaked and quickly put the book away.

"I-I-I'm sorry!" He panicked, turning around, "I was just curious and I didn't know what to do and-"

"Calm down, there's no need to panic." Assured a man in a suit with brown hair tied back and a beard, brushing off the issue. "You must be Simon, correct?"

"Y-yes sir." He said stiffening.

"At ease." Said the man, grabbing a file from his desk. "I am the leader of Cademeca's branch of Ad Libitum, Van Grants, and I assume you've met Legretta already." Simon nodded. "From what I understand, you've already had experience working for a guild correct?" Van continued, Simon nodded again. "I assume you don't need me to explain how the guild works, correct."

"… Yes sir." Simon replied. Van looked over the file a few more times then put it back on his desk.

"Follow me." He ordered. Simon quickly obeyed and followed Van out of the room, across the lobby, dodging guild members and down a flight of stairs. The room he was lead to looked deserted with the exception of two people, punching bags lay in a row in a corner and he saw stuffed figures tied on steaks stitched in several areas, no one tended to the equipment in the room. Van signaled Simon to stay put as he walked up to the two people. Simon noticed that one of the people was a large humanoid black cat, the other was a young boy wearing a fedora, he didn't seem any older than Robin. Simon grimaced at the thought of being in contact with the beast man as Van silently talked with the two.

"Simon!" He called when he was finished. He stiffened up and jogged up to the three. "This is Eugene," he said gesturing to the cat man, "and Stephen" gesturing to the boy. "They're going to be helping you with this small test."

"Test?" Simon questioned.

"Oh don't worry, it's just a couple of simple jobs, extermination and retrieving." Said Stephen, his voice much higher than any other young man he's met.

"We're going to observe your skills." Stated Eugene.

"Oh … kay …" Said Simon hesitantly, his eyes starting to itch. He frequently blinked in an attempt to relieve the itch.

"I trust you know what to do, I'll let you three go." Said Van giving Eugene a slip of paper before leaving.

"So what are we exterminating?" Stephen asked.

"Says that we have to get rid of a couple of eggbears and retrieve some Sage." Read Eugene.

"All right! Let's go!" Stephen cheered leading the way, Eugene followed closely, Simon rubbed his eyes as he walked behind Eugene. On the way back to the entrance he missed a step and stumbled. He grabbed the walls to regain balance. The other two looked back.

"Are you all right?" Eugene asked.

"I'm fine." Said Simon going back to blinking. Eugene eyed Simon then turned back and walked up stairs. Once outside Simon felt a little better but his eyes still itched.

"So where are we going?" Simon asked.

"To a forest just outside the city, eggbears are common to the area so it isn't uncommon that they would be harassing the people who live on the outskirts." Eugene explained, "Plus we might find some monsters holding some sage."

"All right, let's go!" cheered Stephen.

"Wait a minute." Eugene paused.

"Aww … what now?" Stephan moaned.

"Simon, will you be okay with your allergies?" Eugene asked.

"Allergies?" Asked Simon pretending to not know what he's talking about.

"Be honest Simon, are you allergic to me?" Eugene questioned.

"… How did you know?" Simon responded.

"Your eyes are red, you're tearing up and your voice sounds a bit raspy." Eugene answered bluntly.

"Oh …" Simon sighed, _'After living in with Laurel I didn't even notice.'_

"I'll be fine." He stated.

"Are you sure?" Eugene asked.

"Yeah, I won't let them become a burden." Simon assured.

"Great, the new guy's gonna try to keep his allergies in check, can we go now?" Stephen complained.

"Just one more thing." Said Eugene, Stephan growled, "Everyone has enough items right?"

"I still have some gels but I should be fine." Said Simon.

"I'm fully stocked on everything." Grumbled Stephan.

"All right, now we can go Stephen." Stated Eugene.

"Yes! Finally!" Exclaimed Stephen running off. Simon looked on with shock.

"You will be fine right?" Eugene asked.

"Please, don't worry about me." Said Simon.

XXX

After chasing Stephen through the city, the three wound up in the forest Eugene mentioned earlier. Stephen wandered around looking up trees.

"Stephen don't wander off too far." Eugene warned.

"Yeah yeah," Said Stephen, ignoring his words.

"Um … What is he doing?" Simon asked.

"He's looking for a Nia fruit tree." Eugene replied.

"Nia … fruit?" Simon questioned.

"It's a fruit native to this country, they're used for medicinal purposes." Eugene explained. "Eggbears love Nia fruits so we'll be using some as bait."

"What are you doing just standing there? Those eggbears aren't going to bait themselves!" Stephen called. Eugene spotted something behind the boy. Stephen seemed to have caught on, he pulled out one of his pistols and shot at the branches above him. They heard a screech and a plant monster fell out from a tree, dead.

"What was …" Simon began.

"Those love to hang out in trees and catch their prey by sneaking up on them." Stated Eugene. "We need to keep our guard up."

"Yeah yeah I know!" Moaned Stephan as he started climbing a tree. Simon looked up.

"Find anything?" He asked.

"No …" He moaned.

"Don't go jumping from tree to tree, you remembered what happened last time." Eugene warned.

"Yeah yeah I remember." Stephan moaned then jumping down. Simon heard a rustle and quickly drew his sword only to spot a plant monster walk by, he saw the monster holding a leafy plant.

"Hey is that the sage we need?" He asked.

"Ah ha! Found it!" Stephan shouted scaring the plant monster causing it to run away.

"Never mind…" Simon sighed. Stephan climbed the tree then came and a moment later he came back down with an orange colored fruit.

_'That's the Nia fruit I'm guessing.'_ Simon thought. Eugene nodded. Stephan then smashed the fruit on the ground, which released a foul stench. "Ugh!" He exclaimed holding his nose, his eyes watering more than they normally would with allergies. "You bait these eggbears with this?"

"Well of course!" Said Eugene. Not too long after the egg bears came charging in. Stephan pulled out his pistols and went on a shooting frenzy, Eugene clutched his weapon and charged. Simon on the other hand hesitated and jumped out of the way when an eggbear charged his way, then slashed the back. He blocked the claw of one of them then he twisted his wrist and jabbed the bear. Stephan killed the eggbear for him by shooting it through the head.

"Thanks." Said Simon, followed by an eggbear smacking Simon into a tree. He swallowed an apple gel then got up on his feet and slashed at the eggbear until it was down.

"Are you all right?" Eugene asked killing the last one.

"I'm fine." Said Simon panting.

"Good." Said Eugene. "Now all we need to do is find the sage."

"Well we might not be able to." Said Stephan digging in his bag, he then pulled out a plant the looked like the one Simon saw on a monster.

"You mean you had this the whole time?!" He shouted. Eugene merely sighed in frustration.

"Let's head back." He said, "Oh and Simon, you did good."

XXX

Back at the guild Simon waited for the results. He was getting bored really fast since he didn't have anything to entertain himself. Then Van came up to him.

"Um … how did I do?" He asked.

"Fine, your combat skills still need some work but other than that you've managed to get the job done." He said. This made Simon feel a lit light headed, but in a way that made him want to fly. Van then offered his hand. "Welcome to the guild." Simon gasped as he smiled and gladly shook his hand.

"Th-th-thank you!" He said.

"We'll contact you when you have a job, got that?" He said.

"Yes sir! Thank you!" He repeated. He then ran out of the guilds building. On the way back he glomped Kanonno.

"Whoa! Simon!" She exclaimed. "What's gotten into you?"

"I got into the guild!" He cried hugging her tighter.

"Ugh. Well good for you." She said sounding choked. "Can you please let go?"

"Ah! Sorry!" He said, releasing her.

"So you wanna celebrate with vodka?" She asked.

"No thank you. You always rant when you're drunk." Simon turned down.

"You're no fun." She moaned.

"Is she always this insistent on alcohol?" Veigue asked.

"Yes." Kanonno stated bluntly. Simon said nothing and shrugged. Despite his refusal she got some beer anyway.

**XXX**

**I'm sorry if this is a piece of shit! I haven't written this in so long and I didn't edit it!**


	20. Author's note

To everyone that has been reading Tales of the World: New Age Mythology. I am sorry to announce that I won't be writing this fic anymore. However do expect a rewrite sometime in the future. There are several reasons why this is so.

For one, I've been at school, I don't really have the time to write this. I am just not proud of it, some of the characters seem horribly out of character, the plot wasn't going anywhere, looking back I had several problems with it. I had this whole reincarnation thing planned but it didn't turn out the way I would like it to. Also the dictator thing managed to make the story more complicated than it needed to be. Another thing, I am currently working on another fanfiction for MÄR. I do intend to finish that no matter how shitty it turns out to be. I have a basic outline about what will happen in that. Thirdly, I've been going through chemotherapy, and I have to deal with a transplant coming up. So that would keep me from writing much anyway. I've also been invested in writing an original story. There are also some other fanfiction ideas that have been floating around in my head that I plan to do once the MÄR fanfiction is over. Sorry again to keep you waiting only to disappoint you.


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